NetMoves Unveils Outsourced Enterprise Fax Solution
Automated enterprise fax solutions have seen growth in both convenience and functionality over the past few years, and NetMoves Corp. (www.netmoves.com) wants to take it still further. With the introduction of its FaxMailer fax-outsourcing solution, NetMoves hopes to position itself in the forefront of an emerging market segment for automated enterprise fax solutions: Internet document delivery (IDD).
In the Windows NT space, enterprise fax solutions were given a shot in the arm when Microsoft Corp. released Microsoft Message Queue Server, Enterprise Edition, in late 1997. Message queuing is an asynchronous delivery mechanism that provides program-to-program communication defined by multiple levels of delivery assurance and recovery. Even with a defined message queuing infrastructure, however, enterprises were forced to deploy and support their own fax solutions.
NetMoves’ IDD-based approach brings the concept of message queuing to a new level, leveraging IP-based technology to route faxes over the Internet to NetMoves’ remote FaxMailer hosts. Because it is a fully outsourced approach, FaxMailer requires no dedicated hardware or software, eschews the analog communications infrastructure required by most in-house fax solutions, and eliminates the need for dedicated fax support personnel.
IT managers can deploy FaxMailer by registering end users’ e-mail addresses with NetMoves, which provides hosting services for its FaxMailer customers. According to company officials, the process of sending a fax essentially becomes like sending an e-mail: End users have only to specify a recipient's fax number in the "To" field of their e-mail client and add the domain @netmoves.com. As soon as the message is sent, it is routed to NetMoves' Global Internet Document Delivery (IDD) Network, where it is converted and then delivered as a fax.
FaxMailer can be combined with NetMoves FaxCourier -- a fax-to-e-mail service that routes incoming faxes directly to an end user’s mailbox -- to automate both outbound and inbound faxes, NetMoves officials say. FaxMailer supports a variety of document types, including Microsoft Word and Excel documents, Microsoft Project documents, Lotus SmartSuite documents, HTML, RTF, and PDF documents.
FaxMailer also supports e-mail text and documents using languages other than standard American English, including British English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and simplified Chinese.
According to Mark Gilbert, a research director and fax server analyst at GartnerGroup Inc. (www.gartner.com), the market for automated enterprise fax solutions is ready to take off.
"The market for easy-to-use fax services is starting to gain steam," Gilbert comments. "For enterprises that do not want to own a fax server infrastructure, these services make a lot of sense for faxing to and from the desktop."