From: balasco@auratek.com (Alfred P. Balasco)
Subject: OCR New Product Announcement
Followup-To: poster
Organization: Motorola Computer Group, Schaumburg, IL
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 01:55:41 GMT

AURORA TECHNOLOGIES INC.    	Contact:  Al Balasco - Marcomm Mgr
				    Tel:  (617) 290-4800 Fax: (617) 290-4844

	     AURORA ADDS OCR CAPABILITY TO ITS SPARC IMAGING AND
			 DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT PRODUCTS

	  Full featured software extends SPARC power to office and
		     business productivity applications

WALTHAM, MA - December 9, 1992 - Aurora Technologies, Inc. today
announced sOCRates OCR for SPARC, adding full-featured optical
character recognition (OCR) functionality to SPARC systems and
Hewlett-Packard ScanJet II scanners.  The company also introduced
FirstScan/sOCRates OCR for SPARC, combining OCR capability with the
company's popular FirstScan image-capture software.  These new
products extend Aurora's popular imaging and document management
product line into mainstream business applications, such as forms
processing, information acquisition, and document management.

sOCRates accomplishes in minutes, what data entry staffs need hours or
even days to complete: sOCRates automatically converts text images of
any font or type style from a broad range of printed materials --
including draft-quality dot matrix, typewritten, facsimile, laser
printed and multi-generation photocopies -- into computer-readable
ASCII text.  Based on Calera Recogni- tion Systems' award-winning OCR
technology, sOCRates provides up to 99.9% character recognition
accuracy.  The converted text can be used directly by a wide variety
of SPARC desktop application software, including databases,
spreadsheets, document publishing, email, and word processors.
sOCRates' intuitive "point-and-click" OPEN LOOK interface allows both
new and experienced users to easily take advantage of the software's
built-in features.
 
A powerful forms processing tool simplifies data capture from custom
business forms like questionnaires and applications, allowing easy
creation and modification of text and image databases.  An editor, for
example could use sOCRates to translate paragraphs or sections of this
document for direct input into newsletters or articles by outlining
only the text blocks he needs.  sOCRates will identify and convert
only the selected text.

FirstScan/sOCRates OCR for SPARC integrates sOCRates' features with
the capability to scan and capture high-quality text and graphic
images from many sources including faxes, engineering documents,
business reports, newspapers and line drawings.

"As prices come down and accuracy increases with today's OCR programs
such as sOCRates, we see OCR entering the business application arena
for UNIX workstations," said Tim Haney, Marketing Manager of HP's
Greeley Hardcopy Division. "With FirstScan/sOCRates and the HP ScanJet
scanner, users can enjoy the versatility of text and image scanning -
all in one convenient package."

According to Dennis Daudelin, Aurora Technologies' President,
"Aurora's introduction of these cost effective, feature-rich imaging
and OCR solutions is another step forward for the corporate world
where the power of SPARC systems is being utilized with increasing
frequency for office and business productivity applications.  OCR
functionality is the ideal adjunct to SPARC desktop applications like
Lotus 1-2-3, Wordperfect, Framemaker, and Interleaf."

Both software packages install with a single command, and include a
helpful User's Guide along with the company's standard comprehensive
one year warranty.

sOCRates includes the following productivity features:

	Omnifont Recognition - documents of virtually any font,
typeface, and font style are recognized automatically without
requiring system `training'.  Other OCR products require
time-consuming system training sessions for new fonts and styles.
sOCRates also reads portrait, landscape and multi-column pages with
ease.

	Forms Processing - using the powerful Template Definition
tools, users can easily create page recognition zone templates that
automatically capture data from specific sections of standard forms.
Users have complete control of the processing order of the template
zones, and there's virtually no limit to the number of text, image, or
numeric zones per page.

	Specialized Vocabularies - easily add new words to the
Recognition Dictionary for automatic recognition of specialized terms,
such as those found in medical, legal, engineering, financial, or
insurance vocabularies.

	Fast Proofing - display the original scanned image and
converted text side-by-side with the Verifier window for effortless
on-screen proofing.

	Command-line Control - users can control many of sOCRates'
features via the command-line interface, allowing inexpensive ASCII
terminals to process pages and create shell scripts for unattended or
batch operation when using the HP Automatic Document Feeder.

PRICING:	sOCRates OCR for SPARC comes with OCR software,
comprehensive documentation, and a one year warranty. List price is
$1995.00

		FirstScan/sOCRates OCR for SPARC comes complete with
FirstScan image-capture and sOCRates OCR software, SCSI device driver,
comprehensive documentation, a high-quality 6' SCSI cable, a
pass-through terminator, and a one year warranty. List price is
$2495.00.

AVAILABILITY: 	December 1992

COMPATIBILITY: 	SPARC systems running SunOS 4.1 and higher.
OpenWindows 2.0 and higher, Motif Window Manager, and X-Windows. HP
ScanJet IIc (color and grayscale) and IIp (grayscale) scanners. Full
support for the HP Automatic Document Feeder.

Aurora Technologies, Inc., develops and markets a complete range of
SPARC workstation performance enhancement and expansion products.
These include SBus peripheral servers and SBus expansion devices,
communications and networking products, and imaging and OCR software.
Founded in 1988 by members of Sun's marketing and engineering teams,
Aurora is a member of SPARC International and Sun Microsystems' third
party developer Catalyst program.
				# # #

SPARC is a registered trademark of SPARC International. FirstScan and
sOCRates OCR for SPARC are trademarks of Aurora Technologies, Inc. All
other trademarks and registered trademarks are the proprietary
property of their respective owners.
Newsgroups: comp.newprod