FirePond Forms Alliance With Akamai Technologies to Maximize Web Site Performance For eBusinesses
Akamai To Enhance the Rich, Interactive Capabilities of the FirePond Application Suite in B2B Commerce Environments
biz.yahoo.com
WALTHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 24, 2000-- FirePond (NASDAQ:FIRE - news), a leader in integrated e-business sales and marketing solutions, today announced an alliance with Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:AKAM - news), the foremost provider of global, high-performance services for the delivery of Internet content, streaming media, and applications. Through this agreement, FirePond and Akamai will offer interactive selling solutions for business-to-business e-commerce, characterized by optimal performance and reliability. As a result, all new and existing FirePond customers can elect to take advantage of Akamai's Internet content delivery capabilities without any modification to their Web site.
The powerful combination of the FirePond Application Suite with Akamai's FreeFlow(SM) content delivery service will allow Web properties to ensure a better overall experience for their customers and partners. With the addition of FreeFlow, FirePond customers can deliver rich, secure, authenticated and dynamic content and streaming media quickly and reliably to end users, enhancing the end user's online experience and increasing the likelihood of customer conversion during an interactive selling session.
''The power of our applications is directly related to our ability to bring a company's brand identity to life within interactive selling sessions. This requires exceptional performance when delivering highly interactive content and application functionality,'' said Joel Radford, FirePond's Vice President of Business Development. ''With the ability to bring Akamai's FreeFlow service to our customers, we can ensure that our customers have accelerated access to this type of dynamic content, providing a more productive experience to their dealers, agents, partners and customers.''
''We understand the need for rapid information delivery in facilitating online interactions and are simplifying content delivery in a powerful way,'' said Chris Turner, director of channel sales and programs, Akamai. ''FirePond's selling solutions for business to business commerce complement our content delivery capabilities. Together, they offer rich and engaging content faster and more reliably across a company's multiple selling channels.''
About FirePond
Based in Waltham, Mass., FirePond (www.firepond.com) is a leading provider of integrated e-business sales and marketing solutions that enable companies to optimize their customer relationships and maximize the effectiveness of their Internet-based and traditional sales channels. The FirePond Application Suite allows companies to merge their e-commerce selling, customer relationship management, and channel management strategies on a single, Internet-based platform.
FirePond's solutions provide the foundation for next generation e-business sales and marketing initiatives at some of the world's largest companies, including GM, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota, Empire Blue Cross and Blue Shield, IBM and Hitachi Construction Machinery.
Portions of this release contain forward-looking statements regarding future events and are subject to risks and uncertainties. We wish to caution you that there are some factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results indicated by such statements. These factors include, but are not limited to: integration and market acceptance of content delivery services and applications, quarterly fluctuations in operating results attributable to the timing and amount of orders for our products and services, market acceptance of our FirePond Application Suite and its components, our ability to keep pace with changing product requirements and factors affecting the demand for e-business sales and marketing solutions, and those factors contained in the section titled Risk Factors beginning on page 4 of our Registration Statement on Form S-1 (No. 333-90911) as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
FirePond is a trademark of FirePond, Incorporated. All other product or company names are the properties of their respective owners.
Contact:
Brodeur Worldwide for FirePond
Steve Marchant
617-587-2864
smarchant@brodeur.com |
