Dolphin Newsletter - July 2005
Index:
- From Steve Palmer CEO and Noel Duffy MD.
- Dolphin Pen is a winner!
- Dolphin Pen: Cover for Loss, Theft or Damage.
- New Maps released.
- What's happening in Development?
- Dolphin around the world.
- Events.
- Dolphin winners at QAC Sight Village 2005.
From Steve Palmer CEO and Noel Duffy MD.
For many years Dolphin has been issuing a regular monthly newsletter giving details about new product developments, helpful tips, special offers and success stories. Having listened to what many of you have had to say, we have decided to revise the style of the newsletter that give more insight into the Company, its people and its activities around the world.
Dolphin has been operating since 1986 and over the course of this time many changes have occurred, not only to Dolphin, but to the technology and in particular to people's awareness and expectations of what this should mean to them. One of the nice aspects of this newsletter format is that it gives us the opportunity to explain these changes and how Dolphin's strategies are helping to shape the industry.
Peter Diamond and Paul Blenkhorn, two former founders of Dolphin, once said "what motivates us is the belief that we can give people opportunity to succeed in whatever they do, regardless of what obstacles are put in their way".
This has always been a driving factor behind the company and continues to motivate us all today. Over the coming months we hope you will get to see our commitment through the regular contributions to this newsletter, and how we are looking to use the expertise we have built up, to branch out into new markets, without sacrificing the foundations the Company has been built upon.
Many of you will have noticed a lot of development activity in the past year. This has not happened by accident. We are committed to expanding our branded range of products, built around mainstream solutions, with the Pen range and soon to be followed by Pocket Hal, the first full screen reader to work with an industry standard PDA. Both of these products give our customers the kind of mobility enjoyed by sighted users without having to use proprietary products.
Extensive research has shown that there are many similarities between the features required to support dyslexia and those required to help with visual impairment, so Dolphin has been using its expertise to bridge that gap and create products that will help with a range of print problems.
Dolphin will therefore soon be launching a new Education division within the company, which will include a range of products designed to support people with dyslexia and other print impairments. The range of products will include solutions to help with reading and writing, as well as simple tools to help create accessible digital talking books, helping those with dyslexia as well as those with vision impairments to gain access to printed materials.
Dolphin Pen is a winner!
There has been an excellent response to the Dolphin pen in recent weeks. Many users find the ability to take their screen reader or magnifier with them extremely useful: computer engineers who need to check clients' computers, students who need to work at home and at college, teachers who need to check pupil's work, and office workers who hot desk or work from home - in fact anyone who needs a "roaming profile" but is not connected to an accessible network. We're also pleased to report a very positive response from number of universities libraries and companies who are making their PCs dolphin friendly, meaning that Dolphin Pen users can 'plug and go' on PCs which already have the Dolphin Interceptor installed.
Dolphin Pen: Cover for Loss, Theft or Damage.
Many customers have told us they are concerned about loosing their Dolphin Pen - no problem! We can now offer 12 months cover with a replacement Pen in case of loss, theft or damage.
Loss Cover is valid for 12 months only, but may be renewed after 12 months. Only one replacement Pen may be claimed in any 12 month period. Once a replacement Pen is issued, the customer will receive a new serial number and the old serial number will be deregistered and no longer valid for support, upgrades or updates. Cover costs just £50 per Dolphin Pen for 12 months.
New Maps released.
The latest set of new and updated maps for versions 6.01, 6.02, 6.50 and 6.51 software are now available via the Internet Updater. They can also be obtained from the Dolphin website.
2 new maps and 2 updated maps are available for update from the Internet updater this month. These include:
New maps:
- MSN Messenger 7 v1
- Internet Explorer Italian
Updated maps:
- Microsoft Outlook 2000 / XP / 2003 v1.29
- Microsoft Word XP v2.12
What's happening in Development?
Dolphin's team of dedicated developers is busy finalising the release of Pocket Hal, the screen reader for PDAs running the Windows mobile operating system. This is a tremendous success for the development team, producing the world's first complete screen reader for off-the-shelf PDAs, solving many technical difficulties on the way.
Recently demonstrated at Sight Village, Pocket Hal continues to be one of the most talked about access innovations.
Look out for the product review in the next issue of AccessIT.
Dolphin also continues to develop its other well-known products. For instance, the Cicero OCR package is being enhanced giving much greater recognition accuracy and will be released in September. Orpheus, Dolphin's own speech synthesiser, is having natural sounding Swedish voices added and Dolphin is in the early stages of preparing human sounding Dutch voices for Orpheus.
Dolphin around the world.
We were delighted to welcome a number of international dealers to this year's Sight Village. As in the UK, the interest surrounding the Dolphin Pen and the plans for Pocket Hal later in the year were at the forefront of our discussions and presentations.
Supernova, Hal, Lunar and LunarPlus are currently available in 16 language editions. In v6.5x Arabic, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English (UK and US), French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Spanish and Swedish are all available to select directly from the Dolphin control panel. In addition, Croatian, Finnish, Polish & Portuguese are currently available in earlier versions and awaiting release to v6.5x.
Since last month, Dolphin dealers around the world have also been able to offer customers the new RealSpeak Solo voices from Scansoft with purchases of Supernova, Hal, LunarPlus and EaseReader at a very reasonable price. Realspeak Solo is available to purchase with a product upgrade for existing customers.
At the request of a number of dealers, we are pleased to introduce a 12 month Cover option for the Dolphin Pen, which will guarantee a replacement if your pen is lost, stolen or damaged. Cover is limited to one replacement during the cover period. Please ask your local supplier for more details.
Dolphin is having a successful season of summer conferences in the USA. We were present at both the NFB conference in Kentucky and the ACB conference in Las Vegas. Once again, there was massive interest in the latest products from Dolphin, including the Pen drive editions and the Pocket Hal screen reader for PDAs. Everyone was excited by the prospect of being able to access mainstream PDA devices, which can be purchased from regular computer stores.
Events.
Solutions 2005
The next event that Dolphin will be exhibiting at will be the RNIB sponsored Solutions 2005, which is on Friday 5th August 2005, at the RNIB, 105 Judd Street, London, WC1H 9NE.
If you would like to know more about Dolphin resources and access technology for blind and partially sighted people of all age groups, come along to Solutions 2005 and speak with Dave.
Solutions is being organised in partnership between RNIB and Blind in Business, a small charity giving young blind or partially sighed graduates the confidence and practical help they need to achieve professional careers. It also offers employers the confidence and knowledge they need to employ blind or partially sighted graduates.
AHEAD 2005
Dolphin will also be exhibiting and presenting at the forthcoming AHEAD Conference in Milwaukee, USA. The conference will focus on solutions for students with disabilities within higher education. Dolphin will be demonstrating their range of access solutions and DAISY solutions at the conference.
The AHEAD Conference runs from 3rd - 6th August, with Dolphin sponsored pre-conference workshops running on the 1st - 2nd August. The venue is the Midwest Airlines Center in Milwaukee. If you are planning to attend the conference, please drop by the Dolphin booth number 35/36 for a demonstration of Dolphin's latest range of education solutions.
Dolphin winners at QAC Sight Village 2005.
The Dolphin pen received more rave reviews at the recent QAC Sight Village 2005 with many people visiting the Dolphin stand to experience this latest portable access solution. Dolphin ran a free prize draw for a Dolphin Pen on each of the days of the exhibition, and Dolphin would now like to congratulate the following winners from Sight Village:
Brenda Williams who was the first winner on Tuesday said; "I will really find the Dolphin pen useful, I will be able to use it at college, to do my ECDL, course. Thank you Dolphin"
David Taylor was Wednesday's winner and Penny Duce won on Thursday.
