ABBYY announces Mobile OCR SDK

New toolkit enables simple, fast integration of OCR and business card
reading functionality into applications for mobile phones, PDAs, pen
scanners, and other handheld devices

ABBYY Software House today announced ABBYY Mobile OCR SDK, a software development toolkit (SDK) for integrating optical character recognition (OCR) and business card reading functions into mobile platforms and applications.

The new SDK offers a truly OS-independent technology which can be
integrated into any mobile platform including the Windows Mobile,
Symbian, and LINUX operating systems. Designed with the needs of mobile
solution providers in mind, ABBYY Mobile OCR SDK combines powerful
recognition functions with a small software footprint which uses minimal
hardware resources.  With its small code-size, the Mobile OCR SDK is
extremely efficient and can provide instant results, an essential
requirement for mobile solutions. Developers can easily embed OCR
functionality into any mobile imaging device, including camera phones,
digital cameras, PDAs, palmtops, handheld scanners, and other
camera-based hardware. OCR embedded into handheld devices allows users
to easily capture notes from documents, books, and presentations and
quickly transform them into editable and searchable digital information.

Based on Proven Technology Already In Use
Developers, service providers, and hardware manufacturers can have
confidence in the functionality provided through ABBYY Mobile OCR SDK
because the current product is second- generation technology already in
use by leading customers. ABBYY first premiered a small-code- sized
version of its OCR toolkit in 1999 when the technology was integrated
into the C-Pen, a small handheld pen scanner. OCR implementation in the
C-Pen required less than 2 MB of disk space and was combined with an
ABBYY Lingvo dictionary.

"Since 1999, ABBYY has pioneered new ways to make OCR available for a
variety of mobile applications," explained Alexander Rylov, Chief
Product Manager for ABBYY. "With the recent advancements in mobile
hardware and digital camera technology, the time is right for this type
of mobile recognition technology. Digital cameras have become a standard
feature in mobile phones and PDAs and users are quickly learning how to
take advantage of these functions. Providing compatibility with any
platform and with significantly enhanced functionality, this new version
will help hardware vendors turn mobile phones and other handhelds into
powerful business devices."

Enabling Business Card Reading Applications on Mobile Devices
One key function in ABBYY Mobile OCR SDK is identifying and extracting
contact information from business cards. By building this core
technology into their development plans, developers can create business
card reading applications for camera phones or other handheld imaging
devices. When a user takes a picture of a business card, for example, an
application can be designed to read the image and identify key fields
such as company, name, phone number, and email address. This application
can then be linked to an address/phone book application. As a result, a
user can instantly store business card information direct to his mobile
phone or phone book in just a few simple steps and without a lot of
telephone keypad typing.
 
Key Features and Benefits
ABBYY Mobile OCR SDK delivers excellent recognition quality and accuracy
with high processing speed. It offers development support specifically
designed for the mobile application market. Key features include:

High Accuracy and Multilingual Support - Based on award-winning ABBYY
FineReader technology, Mobile OCR SDK ensures the best possible
recognition quality. It supports 60 languages, including Bulgarian,
Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek,
Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish,
Turkish, and Ukrainian.

Platform-Independent SDK - Mobile OCR SDK can be easily integrated into
any operating system including Windows, Windows Mobile Edition, Symbian
OS, Windows CE, ucLinux, LINUX, and some proprietary operating systems
for GSM and CDMA phone platforms. In addition to the base software
functionality, ABBYY offers special services for this product line
including porting the software to other platforms and customisation for
special tasks.

Small Footprint - With a small code size, Mobile OCR SDK is optimised to
run with low memory resources requiring only 1.5 to 5Mb of RAM and from
2 to 20Mb of ROM.

Digital Camera OCR - Mobile OCR SDK includes special algorithms for
handling image distortions typically associated with images taken with
digital cameras to help ensure excellent recognition quality.

Business Card Processing Support - Mobile OCR SDK offers intelligent
text parsing capabilities specialised for reading text from business
card images. This allows developers to add functions into mobile devices
for capturing and converting contact information from business card
images (such as name, phone, mobile phone, e-mail, fax, company name,
job title, address, and web-address) directly into an address book, from
field to field. The new SDK supports English, French, German, Italian,
Portuguese, Russian and Spanish languages for business card recognition.

Additional Applicability: Instant OCR for PC Utilities
With the Mobile OCR SDK, OCR technology can be integrated into various
PC-based utilities, which require high operating speed and minimum
memory resources. As a result of its small code size and high
performance, the SDK can be used for pop-up dictionaries, pop-up
utilities for training and explanation purposes, reading applications
(such as for people with impaired eyesight), desktop search, and
anti-spam filtering utilities where the time for loading, operating and
unloading is crucial.

ABBYY Mobile OCR SDK is available immediately. For detailed product
information visit: abbyy.com