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Predictive text technology from Zi Corporation, Calgary, AB-based provider of intelligent interface solutions, are embedded in the P990, the latest generation smartphone from Sony Ericsson, the company announced.
The successor to the Sony Ericsson P910, the P990 sets new standards in smartphones delivering 3G/UMTS as well as tri-band GSM and GPRS connectivity. It is also one of the few WiFi enabled phones, supporting the IEEE802.11b technology.
eZiText provides faster and more efficient text entry through truly predictive one-touch entry and word completion, coupled with the ability to learn from a person's usage patterns and new vocabulary, the developer describes. The eZiTap FEP is a downloadable version of Zi's embedded eZiTap software and serves as a front end processor (FEP) to offer predictive text entry through the phone's virtual keyboard. The download version is also available for Sony Ericsson's series of P800, P900 and P910 Symbian UIQ smartphones.
"The decision by Sony Ericsson to embed Zi's predictive text solutions in its new pioneering P990 smartphone confirms Zi's position at the forefront of technological innovation," comments Milos Djokovic, chief technical officer and chief operating officer of Zi Corporation, "We are delighted with this decision which shows our chosen path is coming to fruition."
"Users of our advanced smartphones expect predictive text input capability as part of the overall feature set of the device," said Brendan Press, Head of Enterprise Marketing, Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications, "Zi's eZiText and eZiTap FEP solutions are the cutting edge of predictive text technology and we are pleased to be able to incorporate them both in the new P990."
The Sony Ericsson P990 provides two user interfaces known as flip closed and flip open. Flip closed mode utilises the eZiText solution on the 12 button keypad and flip open the award-winning eZiTap FEP for the standard/default virtual and hardware keyboards. Zi's technology offers advanced features which provide the user with truly predictive and seamless input capability, whether using the keypad, keyboard or handwriting. Zi predictive text features on the P990 include: dual language messaging, learning and personalisation, and multiple candidate and next word prediction. Eighteen of Zi's fifty-four predictive text language databases are also supported by the P990.
To support the advanced capabilities of the P990 the device utilizes Symbian OS v9.1 together with the UIQ Technology 3.0 user interface.
"Up to Q3 2005 almost 48 million Symbian OS smartphones had shipped worldwide," said Simon Garth, VP of Marketing, Symbian. "We are delighted to be working with Sony Ericsson, Zi Corporation and UIQ Technology in bringing the P990 to market and believe the phone will be even more successful than its predecessor."
"In driving the uptake of advanced mobile data services the usability of the handset interface is the most important factor," said Peter Molin, Chief Technical Officer of UIQ Technology, "By adding Zi's advanced text input to UIQ 3, our software platform, the usability of the device is significantly increased."
Zi's technology allows the P990 handset to support the following languages; Czech, Danish, Dutch, English (UK&US), Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Latin America Spanish, Norwegian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish.
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