FacetCorp Announces Next Generation Telephone System; FacetPhone -- IP-PBX for Small to Medium Sized Businesses.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

PLANO, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 29, 2003

FacetCorp has announced the availability of FacetPhone(TM), a next generation IP-PBX business communications system. FacetPhone is a state-of-the-art on-premise telephone system for small to medium sized businesses (SMBs). FacetPhone offers features not available in other phone systems, and its design architecture results in better reliability and lower cost than other offerings.

FacetPhone comes with all the features you expect in a phone system, as well as important capabilities that normally do not come as part of a PBX system. FacetPhone includes features such as voice mail, auto-attendant, conferencing, automatic call distribution, callerID support, and call detail recording. In addition, FacetPhone provides visual voice mail management, enterprise instant messaging, computer telephony integration with UNIX or Linux or Windows applications, presence and availability management, roaming extensions, and branch office and telecommuter support for toll bypass and true remote employee integration.

The FacetPhone architecture is based on a Linux or UNIX server, external media gateways, and standard analog telephones which make the phone system inherently flexible, reliable and cost effective. FacetPhone runs on standard computer hardware with the highly reliable UNIX or Linux operating systems. The media gateways are external to the computer chassis so the FacetPhone system does not need to be turned off for routine maintenance or even to add gateway hardware. By using standard, low cost analog phones, customers save money and have complete flexibility and control to use any phone they wish, including portables, headsets, speakerphones, corded phones, etc.

"We are pleased to see FacetCorp, a long time SCO partner, release FacetPhone on SCO OpenServer, an operating system known for its reliability and performance," said Jeff Hunsaker, senior vice president of worldwide marketing of The SCO Group. "FacetCorp continues its strong history of integrating disparate environments with the release of FacetPhone, which not only runs on SCO OpenServer but also allows SCO applications to dial the phone and get callerID information for customer 'screen pops.' Running this mission critical application on SCO OpenServer is a real win for our many mutual customers."

FacetPhone is a complete IP-PBX designed to replace the customer's existing phone system. Customers may select from the hundreds of standard telephones available, and all of the basic telephony features in FacetPhone are available through the normal telephone user interface (TUI). However, when a user has a computer on their desktop, FacetPhone becomes a very rich product significantly enhancing user productivity through its graphical user interface (GUI). For example, users can instantly see the location and status of personnel either by department or for the entire company.

FacetPhone provides complete computer telephony integration (CTI) for both UNIX/Linux and Microsoft Windows software applications. Until now, there has not been an easy way for customers to integrate their UNIX and Linux applications into their phone system. FacetPhone has solved this limitation by developing a new protocol called UTAPI(TM) (UNIX Telephone Application Programming Interface). With UTAPI, a customer may quickly and easily dial out from, and get callerID information into their UNIX or Linux applications. And of course, users can dial out of their TAPI enabled MS Windows applications as well as get automatic "screen pops" based on the callerID information. FacetPhone supports Outlook, Goldmine and Act! and any other TAPI enabled Windows application. Being able to have the caller's records in front of an employee the moment they answer the phone has a very positive impact on the quality of customer service.

The FacetPhone graphical user interface also gives each user a visual view of their voice mail in a sortable list including the callerID information. The visual voice mail becomes truly meaningful and useful by allowing a quick text annotation to be associated with each message; so, at a glance, the user can instantly tell who the message is from and what it is about without having to listen to them all again. With FacetPhone's enterprise instant messaging, desktop computer users can also quickly communicate text messages internally between either individuals or groups, even if they are on the phone. And with the intuitive graphical user interface, customers may manage system changes and configuration information themselves without the need or expense of calling in the "phone expert."

"As IP telephony technologies began to come to market, we realized that the business telephone system had become a computer networking application, which was a great match with our existing skill set for the development of this product," commented Jim Bryant, president of FacetCorp. "Furthermore, we felt that our large network of computer networking resellers would be well suited to understand, sell and support an IP-PBX like FacetPhone. Our beta program with some of these resellers has proven this assessment to be correct. Since many of our existing resellers sell UNIX based applications, we developed the FacetPhone UTAPI interface which will allow them to easily integrate FacetPhone with those applications," continued Bryant. "No other phone system can provide this integration with UNIX applications. As we move forward, we are excited about the opportunity to use our focus on product quality and support that has earned us such a great reputation to make FacetPhone a leader among next generation business communications systems."

"FacetPhone has been in development for over three years and is the culmination of our largest product effort. Recent market data suggests that the implementation of IP-PBX technology by smaller businesses is accelerating which bodes well for the timing of FacetPhone's release," said Paul Vance, FacetCorp general manager. "And from a pricing viewpoint, FacetPhone lowers the bar enabling more companies to benefit from the IP-PBX technology. FacetPhone is targeted initially at our existing channel of UNIX/Linux and vertical resellers, and we are eager to offer our partners this great opportunity to both expand their business within their existing customers as well as to add new customers."

FacetPhone is currently available on Linux, SCO OpenServer, IBM AIX and Sun Solaris. Additional platforms will be supported in the future. FacetPhone is available immediately through FacetCorp's existing channel of authorized resellers.

About FacetCorp:

FacetCorp is a privately held company located in Plano, Texas, USA. FacetCorp develops business communications and networking solutions with an emphasis on premier customer service. FacetCorp's products include FacetPhone, FacetWin, FacetWin DT, and FacetTerm. FacetPhone is a complete business communications system for small to medium sized businesses. FacetWin is the all-in-one Windows to UNIX/Linux software connectivity product. FacetWin DT is a low cost terminal emulator for serial connections. And, FacetTerm provides multiple sessions for character-based UNIX or Linux applications. FacetCorp can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.facetcorp.com.

FacetWin and FacetTerm are registered trademarks of FacetCorp. FacetPhone and UTAPI are trademarks of FacetCorp. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are property of their respective owners.

For images, customer comments, and feature summary: http://www.facetcorp.com/pr_facetphone_1.3_5-03.html