Brand Communications Announces Major New Contract from Unisys

25th June 1999

Brand Communications Limited, the leading supplier of GSM LAN access solutions, has today announced that Unisys has equipped all UK Customer Service engineers with Brand’s Apollo solution. The engineers will use Apollo to access the Unisys Corporate Mobile Workbench (CMW) host application via GSM. The contract was won against stiff competition from various networks, technologies and remote access providers, and is the result of a strong partnership between Brand and Unisys to deliver a solution that really delivers benefits to Unisys and their customers.

The award-winning Apollo solution consists of software for each engineer’s portable PC, and an Access Server as the communications hub between GSM and the Unisys LAN. Apollo seamlessly extends the Unisys LAN environment to the mobile engineer by using the unique combination of spoofing, resilient call recovery, security and compression. Together Apollo and CMW add up to a virtual LAN connection for each and every engineer, and they deliver a totally satisfying and high-performance system.

David Smith of Unisys commented: "We are delighted with the Brand Apollo solution. It is the only one that we have found to combine ultra-reliability with the cost savings that Brand’s spoofing gives. By intelligently dropping the GSM call when there is no data being passed, we have reduced our on-line time by 75%. Across all 230 engineers that will save a significant amount of GSM airtime, and we are confident that the system will pay for itself in months rather than years."

The existing Unisys CMW application required no modification, and the cost of deployment was minimal, unlike proprietary networks and vendors where the benefits might have been swamped by the cost and delay of development.

Graeme Birch, of Unisys added: "To convince everyone internally of the benefits, we needed to run a trial. Brand was very supportive, and they had a fully working system up and running within days. It enabled 12 selected engineers to hammer the system, and it enabled the management to produce a meaningful cost/benefit analysis. The results were extremely positive, and they enabled us to raise the support for a full rollout within very short timescales. Brand’s philosophy of sticking to standards has really paid dividends for us."

The Unisys Brand relationship is now set to grow even stronger, as Unisys look at other areas of the business that could benefit from Apollo, including ISDN users (e.g.. at home) and all of the other engineers across Europe.

Martin Kendrick, MD of Brand summarised: "This contract is important for the industry as it clearly shows just how easy mobile data can be, as long as it is approached using open standards and a strong partnership. Unisys are leading the way, and they have proved beyond doubt that GSM Data can not only work, but can deliver superb competitive advantage. It is yet another success for Brand, and we are delighted to be associated with such a prestigious project."

About Brand Communications

Brand Communications is a global leader in mobile data and remote access solutions. We develop, manufacture and market a range of leading mobile, remote office and site-to-site access solutions for all environments including ISDN, PSTN, Fixed Lines, Satellite, GSM and GPRS.

Apollo has helped to significantly grow the number of active GSM data users worldwide and has delivered tangible paybacks to many networks and their users. Apollo continues to deliver such rich benefits to HSCSD, GPRS and 3G networks. More information can be found at http://www.brandcomms.com

For further information on Brand Communications Ltd, contact:

Miss Katie Sarah Ruff
Brand Communications Limited
Trinity House
Ermine Business Park
Huntingdon
Cambs, PE29 6XY

Tel: +44 (0)1480 442100   Email: katier@brandcomms.com
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