Socket Announces Plug-In Card With Advanced Bar Code Scanning Capability for New Palm Handhelds
Monday March 19, 12:05 am Eastern Time (2001)
Press Release
SOURCE: Socket Communications, Inc.
In-Hand Scan Card for Palm m500 Series Handhelds Will Integrate Laser Scan Engine From Symbol Technologies into an SDIO Card Reader's Note: This release complements today's announcement from Palm, Inc. regarding the Palm m500 series handheld computers.
NEWARK, Calif., March 19 /PRNewswire/ -- Socket Communications, Inc. (Nasdaq: SCKT - news; PSE: SOK - news) today announced the In-Hand Scan Card for Palm(TM) handhelds, a plug-in card that integrates a miniature power-efficient laser scanner engine from Symbol Technologies (NYSE: SBL - news) to add advanced bar code scanning capability to Palm m500 and m505 handheld computers, also announced today. By integrating Symbol's miniature scan engine onto a Secure Digital I/O (SDIO) card, the In-Hand Scan Card for Palm handhelds offers an instant plug-in solution that lets you use your Palm handheld to scan bar codes with one hand.
The Symbol scan engine incorporated into Socket's card makes automatic data collection easy, fast and accurate. Because Socket's standards-based SDIO card can deliver power to the laser scanner from a host Palm handheld, no extra batteries are needed. Target markets for the In-Hand Scan Card for Palm handhelds include the retail, manufacturing, transportation and medical industries for applications such as inventory management, shipping/receiving, route delivery, field inspection, market research, patient tracking, clinical control, access control and other activities that require point-of-activity mobile data collection.
The device is also ideal for new and emerging consumer-based bar code scanning applications such as scanner-assisted shopping and print-to-web access.
``Palm's adoption of the new SDIO expansion specification represents an exciting opportunity for Socket to extend our line of Battery Friendly plug-in cards to serve the Palm handheld market,'' said Kevin Mills, president and chief executive officer of Socket Communications. ``The current CompactFlash version of our In-Hand Scan Card, which we introduced in 1999, is one of our most successful products, and an SDIO version is a natural addition to our line of scanning solutions.''
``Socket continues to find innovative applications for our miniature, low-power scan engines,'' said Ron Goldman, senior vice president and general manager for Symbol Technologies. ``For value-added mobile computing, the Palm platform has been and continues to be very strategic to us. We believe we're on the front end of an explosive trend for scanning-enabled mobile computers.''
``We are very pleased that Socket is bringing its expertise in standards-based plug-in cards to the Palm Economy,'' said Byron Connell, vice president, Product Management and Planning, Palm, Inc. ``We believe that the combination of Socket's technology and Symbol's laser scanner engines will enable a broad range of exciting consumer and commercial applications for the Palm m500 series.''
Socket expects the In-Hand Scan Card for Palm handhelds to be available in Q4 2001. Estimated street price is $249. Contact for more information is Jack Brandon at jack@socketcom.com. |
