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WirelessDevNet.com Press Release
SmartWorlds iShop Turns Your PocketPC into the Ultimate Shopping Assistant
Cambridge Mass. December 4, 2003. SmartWorlds LLC today announced the release of iShop, free software that turns any PocketPC with wireless capability - Wi-Fi or cellular - into the ultimate personal shopping assistant. By integrating the power of wireless networks, the Internet, PocketPCs, and Amazon.com's Web Services, iShop combines the best of online shopping - product information, reviews and ratings by other consumers, as well as Amazon.com's pricing -with all the advantages of traditional in-store shopping.
iShop revolutionizes the retail shopping experience. Unlike shopping kiosks, which are often hard to find and are usually located far from the product the shopper is interested in, iShop is truly mobile, since shoppers are always on the go; always available, and designed for personal use.
iShop for Books is the first in a series of personal shopping assistants from SmartWorlds. It will soon be followed by iShop for consumer electronics, computers, music, DVDs and other products sold by Amazon.com.
Shoppers using iShop Books simply enter the ISBN (the International Standard Book Number, the 10-digit number that uniquely identifies a book) of any book they are interested in buying into iShop using a telephone keypad - just as easy as dialing a phone number - to receive helpful product-related information.
iShop sends the book's ISBN over the Internet using any available wireless network to the SmartWorlds server, where ratings, reviews and related books are retrieved from Amazon.com via Web Services, optimized for mobile devices, then sent back over the wireless network to the shopper's PocketPC.
iShop's Wish List feature enables shoppers to save a list of books they are interested in - similar to the Wish List feature on many Web sites, and to email the list to themselves or a friend. This feature allows customers to review their Wish List and purchase books from Amazon.com using their desktop or notebook PC.
"iShop is interesting to me because it lets anyone with a wireless PDA bring the power of the Internet right into the store. Consumers can make better buying decisions in the store, or decide to make their purchases online.
This creates a whole new array of opportunities and changes for the consumer and for the retail channels. In the long run, I believe the consumer will be the big winner." said Bill Warner, Founder, Wildfire Communications.
iShop for the PocketPC is available now for free download from www.smartworlds.com/ishop and will be available soon from many other Web sites, such as Handango.com and Download.com. iShop for Java phones will be available for free download from the SmartWorlds web site later this month.
iShop is also available to retailers in an enterprise version for PocketPCs equipped with bar code scanners, which enable shoppers to scan a book's ISBN bar code instantly. The enterprise version of iShop also features interoperability with the store's POS, inventory and customer loyalty programs, custom shopping content, and other features not available on the free, consumer version of iShop. A demo is available at www.smartworlds.com/ishop-demo.htm.
Retailers interested in providing their customers with a version of the iShop personal shopping assistant customized for their stores and product lines should contact SmartWorlds directly.
About SmartWorlds
SmartWorlds produces the SmartWorlds platform for building scalable, context and location aware applications that leverage XML, Macromedia Flash, and Wi-Fi WLANs for hand-held devices. The Company was founded in June 2001 and is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
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