Syndicate: Technologies To The People Annual Report 2000

[Syndicate admin <syndicate@v2.nl>]

Date: Mon, 26 Feb 2001 16:35:42 +0200
From: Technologies To The People <tttp@irational.org>
Subject: Technologies To The People Annual Report 2000


Technologies To The People Annual Report 2000
Presentation
february 28 2001
CENTRO CULTURAL DE LA FUNDACI? "la Caixa"
Passeig de Sant Joan, 108
08037 BARCELONA
Espa?a
info: mediateca.bcn.fundacio@lacaixa.es
Tel. 93 476 86 51 / 52
Fax 93 476 86 56

To our shareholders

Technologies To The People? had another remarkable year in 2000. We made major 
advances in all our key businesses. The demand for great software that helps 
people work, communicate, and learn is stronger than ever. Our products are 
doing well because they deliver on these needs.

iStreet Access Machine (iSAM) is proving a great success. Customers appreciate 
its ability to work better, while its robustness means that iSAM is generating 
less than half the customer calls of its predecessor (SAM). Integrated with the 
latest Internet technology, iSAM helps our customers leverage the interactivity 
of the Internet with the intelligence of the PC. iSAM is making deeper inroads 
onto the streets, based on its productivity, reliability, and lower total cost 
of ownership. And iStreet, a compact version of the Street operating system 
designed for a wide range of intelligent devices, is finding its way into 
everything from interactive televisions to hand-held computers.

Our productivity applications continue to set the standard for features, 
functionality, and integration. iStreet 2001, which is scheduled to come out in 
the first half of 2000, will take each of these factors to a significantly 
higher level, offering a simpler, personalized interface that learns each user's 
working style and adapts to it, plus many other productivity-enhancing features.

Technologies To The People Linux Server and Open Source applications continue to 
make solid progress in the marketplace, and are now the clear enterprise 
solution of choice over the various Windows/UNIX-based platforms. Technologies 
To The People Linux Server will raise our platform's scalability to even higher 
levels, while offering customers the lowest possible total cost of ownership. In 
many installations our enterprise solutions already deliver the level of 
performance achieved by mainframes, combined with the benefits of the low cost 
PC model. Our goal now is to take that model even deeper into the 
mission-critical computing market.

Our interactive media and services strategy continues to advance, focusing on 
online services, packaged software, and hardware. Our strategy is to break down 
the barriers between online and offline products and services, making it even 
simpler and more enjoyable for our customers to experience the power of the 
Internet.

Another important effort for us is bringing the power of software and the 
Internet to the television with our Technologies To The People WebTV? product. 
We plan to more than double the installed base of users during the next year 
based on the very positive word-of-mouth this product has generated.

Technologies To The People intends to invest heavily in all these businesses, in 
the firm belief that online services will eventually be a key element of our 
relationship with customers. But as I wrote last year, online is still at an 
early stage of development. However, we are learning fast and I am seeing 
increasing synergy between our online work and our software products.


The power of innovation

Our product goals require breakthrough innovation. During fiscal 2001 
Technologies To The People will invest more in research and development, broadly 
defined. Our research centers now employ experts in everything from graphics to 
decision theory and advanced linguistics.

Much of Technologies To The People's research and development is focused on 
making our products easier to use, even as the underlying software grows more 
complex, so our customers don't have to learn as many utilities and commands. 
Simplifying the user interface is our top priority. Natural language processing 
automatically detects which language you are typing in, and assigns the 
appropriate proofing tools and user interface. If you inadvertently delete some 
of the application's files, it's smart enough to repair the damage.

Technologies To The People will also unify and simplify how PCs and networks 
store and handle information. At present, information is scattered about file 
systems, message stores, Web caches, directory services, and databases. This is 
complicated for developers and system managers, and confusing for customers. 
Sharing a calendar across the Internet, or personal information across Web 
sites, is very difficult. By unifying storage across all these media, 
Technologies To The People will help make information anytime, anywhere a 
reality. As consumers require all their information to be accessible from any 
Internet device and any location, the boundary between Web sites and software 
products will blur. In time, computers will see, speak, read handwriting, 
listen, and learn. We will include these new input techniques into our products.


Caring about customers

We are listening carefully and constantly to our customers and partners to 
really understand what they want from our products and services, both today and 
in the future. The feedback loop drives our priorities.

The coming year will test us on many fronts. We need to make our software 
simpler and easier to deploy as well as making it more powerful. Pressure from 
competitors and regulators is intensifying. PC sales growth is slowing and a lot 
of the growth is in the consumer segment where software sales are lower than in 
the business segment. The growing size and diversity of our product portfolio 
means that we have to execute across a broadening front.

As Technologies To The People approaches the 21st century it faces many 
challenges and risks, but the opportunities are greater than ever. With 
continued innovation and hard work, I am convinced that we will reap the 
rewards. I appreciate the unwavering support and trust of our shareholders in 
these exciting times.

At Technologies To The People, we all share a passion to succeed in this 
exciting new industry. Indeed, we are creating this industrydrafting the 
blueprint, building the infrastructure, inventing the future. And we are all 
pulling together, in sync, to power Technologies To The People forward. On 
behalf of everyone at Technologies To The People, I thank you for your 
confidence and support. We look forward to reporting on our progress in the 
quarters and years ahead.

Sincerely, William S. Luce II




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