LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Presence Networks Limited, a market leader in secure real time communications, is offering up to 5000 seats free for a year on its new global LiveWorker™ Service to help businesses with limited IT resources start using secure Instant Messaging and online collaboration tools.

CEO Symon Blomfield commented; ‘British Companies are falling some way behind others in using technology to collaborate online, despite research showing there significant business gains to be made including increasing productivity, cutting costs and extending market reach. Our offer will enable even the smallest company to harness the power of this technology in just a few minutes. We hope they will in turn encourage others to join them and jointly create inter-connected, business quality secure live networks with their customers, suppliers and partners. ’

To address the fears many IT Professionals have about the security of Instant Messaging, LiveWorker™ is fully encrypted and records all chat and transactions. The service offer incorporates the latest real-time communications technology with Chat, Web Meetings and encrypted file transfer between users included in the free package, SMS on a pay per use basis and low cost teleconferencing charged on phone bill by User’s existing Service Provider.

For companies seeking to enhance security or to build larger communities, Presence Networks provides enhanced services or large-scale deployed system with sophisticated user admin management and security tools, Anti Virus and integration with Active Directory and other voice and data services.

Business Instant Messaging use is predicted to explode over the next 24 months as Companies seek ways to reduce their costs and improve their productivity and gain competitive edge. Some Analysts even claim that IM use will exceed e-mail by 2010 as email is overwhelmed by SPAM.

Companies can sign-up for free seats at www.presence-networks.net The free offer is limited to 10 seats per company for the first 500 to register and on a first come basis*.

Leo King of ComputerWorld UK reports on David Stanley's presentation at the IDC Security Conference, London, 2007.

The rising use of Instant Messenger technology, from Windows Live Messenger and Yahoo Messenger to companies' own chat software, can be of benefit to businesses if security is properly understood and governed, delegates at an IDC security event were told this week.

David Stanley, VP of business development at Presence Networks, said the risks associated with IM were clear, with a survey of end-users conducted by the security supplier finding that one in four had shared sensitive work information via IM and 75% said their IT department did not monitor those conversations.

PRESENCE NETWORKS SIGNS PC-WARE AS A STRATEGIC SaaS VAR
Secured real-time unified communications expert signs European VAR as strategic channel partner

London, UK, 10 September 2007— Presence Networks Limited, the market leader in secured real-time unified communications, today announced a strategic channel partnership with PC-Ware Limited, one of Europe’s leading software licensing Vale added reseller (VAR). This appointment further strengthens the company’s European growth plans.

PC-Ware has grown to become one of the UK’s top suppliers of software licensing and licensing management since it’s 2003 UK inception. Now employing more than 1,200 people and serving around 85,000 customers across 18 European countries, PC-Ware boasts over 100 UK blue chip corporate, financial and technology customers.

PC-Ware prides itself on being able to advise both in the capacity of a knowledgeable partner and an intermediary at the same time, which is reflected in its long-term partnerships and multiple vendor certification and training programmes.

“With the recent heightened concerns in the UK marketplace about the security vulnerabilities of email, the addition of a secure corporate IM solution like ‘Networker’ into the PC-Ware portfolio will fundamentally raise our proposition”, commented Ben Pickles, Business Manager at PC-WARE.”

Ben continues, “Many of our customers have been asking for us to investigate an alternative real time communications model, and Presence Networks’ timing couldn’t have been better. More and more of our customers are leaning towards collaborative working and the long term benefits of implementing software as a service. With Networker’s ability to extend a corporate network without compromising encryption and recording features, we are able to offer our customers even greater value.”

“The appointment of PC-Ware as a strategic channel partner is another significant step for us.” said Symon Blomfield, Founder and CEO of Presence Networks. “During the forthcoming six months, we aim to raise our game even further, in terms of our commitment towards the channel as our core proposition technology is integrated within their own businesses to bring them an overwhelming competitive advantage. I feel confident that PC WARE will enable Networker to penetrate previously unexplored markets, and provide UK organisations with the only viable, secure and reliable alternative to email.”

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About Presence Networks Limited.

Presence Networks is the market leader in secure real time unified communications. The company’s flagship solution, Networker, delivers presence-based communications that enables users to effectively and securely communicate via a number of web-based functions (IM, eMeeting, teleconference, and file sharing) all within a controlled and authenticated environment. For organisations, Networker enables the deployment of presence based collaborative communications, in a secure, compliant and accountable fashion. Presence Networks is a privately funded UK based organisation with partner alliances throughout Europe, Asia Pac and the US. For more information, see www.presence-networks.net.

About PC-Ware Limited.

PC-Ware Information Technologies AG is one of the leading manufacturer-independent IT enterprises in Europe, offering a comprehensive service portfolio which covers licensing of standardised software, licence management, software asset management, proprietary software solutions and professional IT consulting and IT support, complete system-house services including hardware procurement and IT infrastructure services in addition to financial services.

PC-WARE is the outright market leader in Europe within its core business of software licensing and software asset management. The company was granted European Large Account Reseller (ELAR) status for the whole of Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA region) by Microsoft, one of the company’s key business associates. PC-WARE is ranked third in Germany's system-house league table. Employing more than 1,400 people and serving around 85,000 customers, the company operates subsidiaries in 23 countries in Europe, Africa and Asia.

PC-WARE offers solutions to improve and simplify our customers’ handling of software and decision making processes. For more information, see www.pc-ware.co.uk

PRESENCE NETWORKS ADDS SOPHOS ANTI-VIRUS SCANNING ENGINE INCREASING PROTECTION FOR NETWORKER USERS

Sophos partnership adds momentum to Presence Networks’ leadership in growth market

London, 28 August, 2007 – Presence Networks Ltd., a market leader in secured real-time unified communications, today announced a partnership with IT security and control firm Sophos, to give users a more enhanced experience of secure instant messaging. Users of Networker will now have the confidence that their files will be scanned for malware such as viruses, Trojans, worms and spyware, by Sophos’ world leading, anti-virus (AV) engine (SAV Interface).

As secure instant messaging continues to grow in the enterprise, office workers will increasingly be sending attachments over instant messaging (IM). The integration of SAV Interface will enable Presence Networks’ customers to scan all attachments being uploaded to, and downloaded from, the Networker gateway, protecting both organisations’ networks and workers’ individual desktops. SAV Interface uses innovative technologies such as Behavioral Genotype to provide protection against both known and previously unseen zero-day threats.

Sophos Anti Virus’s scanning engine will be integrated with all versions of Networker. These include: Networker 4.0, the recently launched Networker Web Access Client (developed on Asynchronous JavaScript and XML – ‘AJAX’); and the Networker Mobile Client currently in development for mobile devices such as BlackBerry and selected smartphones. With the Sophos engine sitting on the Networker server, there will not be a negative impact on mobile devices’ processing speeds.

Symon Blomfield, CEO, Presence Networks commented: "Commitment from a global IT security vendor like Sophos is real testimony to the strength of the Networker solution, and that truly secure instant messaging is a technology with massive potential. We’re really excited at the prospect of working closely with Sophos, and are confident this will make Networker an even more compelling proposition to organisations in need of secured, real-time messaging.”

Arthur Robinson, UK Alliances manager at Sophos, added: "The IM market is growing, and while users demand access to such real-time applications, administrators don't want to put their network at risk. Presence Networks have a compelling solution to deliver the benefits of secure IM and we are very pleased to have forged this partnership."

The addition of SAV Interface, which will be available as part of Networker’s File Management option is one of several safeguards that are central to Presence Networks’ secure IM service. Networker’s IM client is hosted on a dedicated central server that offers a remarkable 128-bit secure encryption. With Networker technology, the public IM gateway communicates with the Networker Server that in turn communicates with the Networker Client. At this point the data passes through the Networker Server where the communication is cleansed and recorded, ensuring the highest level of security and eliminating peer-to-peer communications.

SAV Interface integration is available to Presence Networks customers in September.

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Presence Networks and Networker are registered trademarks of Presence Networks Ltd. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.

Vendor hails the release of v4.0 of its flagship Network instant messaging security service

Unified communications vendor Presence Networks is on the hunt for UK channel partners following the launch of its instant messaging (IM) security service.

The firm, which works with Northamber as its UK distributor, last week launched v4.0 of its flagship Network service, which it claimed allows end-users to use IM while minimising the business risks from a range of threats.

Symon Blomfield, chief executive of Presence Networks, said v4.0 is offered as a service, which helps Presence to stand out in the market.

“I don’t think there are any other companies out there offering the same as us,” he said. “It is a fully system-agnostic Software as a Service (SaaS), which firms can link to the messaging service of their choice, including MSN, AOL and Yahoo.

“Our focus is around selling through resellers and distribution. In the UK, we have already signed Computacenter and have had a lot of interest coming from security-focused resellers.”

Firms have three choices with the product, Blomfield said: the reseller can manage it, Presence can manage it or the user can manage it in-house.

He added: “We are keen to keep our channel fairly light to ensure all our partners receive a fair margin. Because we are such a small company, we are focused on making sure our product is right and we focus on the relationships that we have got. We are keen to get partners that have already signed with us moving to ensure that they have the support they need.”

Roger Whitehead, senior analyst at Bloor Research, said: “A managed service such as that provided by Presence can square the circle. It can combine the security, range of services and depth of integration of an enterprise product with the ease of use and scalability that only online services can offer. This is an approach well worth investigating.”