Nuance PDF Converter Enterprise 6 Drives Cost Savings at East Sussex County Council

Low costs, ease of integration and rich feature set makes Nuance’s PDF solution the preferred option

1 October 2009, London, UK - Nuance Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: NUAN), a leading supplier of speech and imaging solutions, has today announced that PDF Converter Professional Enterprise 6 has enabled East Sussex County Council realise a procurement saving in excess of £16,000, thanks to its highly competitive licensing costs. Priced at about a third of the cost of Adobe® Acrobat ® software*, PDF Converter Enterprise retains many of the features, functionality and accuracy of more expensive alternatives.

In addition to PDF Converter Enterprise’s competitive price point saving the council money, its built-in redaction feature negated the need for the council to invest in separate redaction software. This resulted in a potential saving in expenditure of £48,000. Redaction– which the council uses when sharing documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act – enables sensitive data to be securely removed from the PDF. Another built-in feature that has also been of benefit to the council is PDF Converter’s text-to-speech functionality, which turns PDF text into human-sounding synthesised speech and enables the council to comply with Access to Work regulations.

The decision to deploy Nuance PDF Converter Enterprise followed a technical assessment by the council’s IT department, during which PDF Converter met the council’s price, performance, usability and functionality requirements. It is also compatible with Microsoft SharePoint, the application the council will use for building a centralized knowledge database.

Five departments within the council - transport and environment, adult social care, children’s services, corporate resources, and the council’s chief executives – are using PDF Converter to create, amend and distribute newsletters, reports, updates and letters, in the PDF format. Feedback from users has been positive, which much praise for PDF Converter’s accuracy and ease of use.

Commenting on the council’s use of PDF Converter Enterprise, Greg Draven, East Sussex County Council’s Contracts & Procurement Officer, said: “The PDF format is popular for its convenience, security and its ability to reduce the file size of documents, saving on storage space. For us, PDF Converter represents great value for money, not just with respect to its purchase price, but also all of the features it offers as standard.”

The council has also praised PDF Converter’s no-nonsense licensing and installation procedure, which makes set up and maintenance far simpler and easier than competitior solutions, saving the IT department ‘hours’ and enabling them to concentrate on managing more critical IT issues.

As councils and local authorities work to provide exceptional service and value for their citizens against tighter budgets, more councils are moving toward cost effective PDF solutions – earlier this year, Central Bedfordshire Council announced a 3,000 user deployment of Nuance PDF Converter Enterprise.

Since its introduction, PDF Converter Professional has become the leading PDF alternative to Adobe Acrobat, with more than three million of Nuance PDF shipped to individuals and businesses worldwide. Organisations both large and small have discovered the power and benefits within Nuance’s PDF applications, including ALDA Pharmaceuticals Corp., Bayer Industry Services, Best, Best & Krieger, LLP, Credit Suisse Information Technology, Dassault, The Euro Tunnel, French Ministry of Economy and Finance, EOF Technologies, French Social Security, The Gillette Company, Mitsubishi Hitec Paper, The National Institute of Health, Pfizer, Inc., Porsche, Siemens, Tech Data France, Telefunken, Trend Micro, Volkswagen, United States Attorneys Office and Wells Fargo. PDF Converter Professional has won over individual users and organisations through a simple formula – deliver all the rich features needed in a PDF desktop application, including some not available in other solutions, at a price that is up to 50% less than alternatives.

*Price estimate based on current pricing for Adobe Acrobat published on Adobe’s Web site.

Availability and Pricing

PDF Converter 6 starts from £49.99 inc. VAT and is available from Nuance and its global network of resale partners. PDF Converter Professional 6 has a suggested retail price of £99.99 inc. VAT, while PDF Converter Enterprise 6 Edition starts from £149 + VAT. For additional information on features, pricing and volume licensing programs, please visit www.nuance.co.uk.

Nuance Communications, Inc.

Nuance (NASDAQ: NUAN) is a leading provider of speech and imaging solutions for businesses and consumers around the world. Its technologies, applications and services make the user experience more compelling by transforming the way people interact with information and how they create, share and use documents. Every day, millions of users and thousands of businesses experience Nuance’s proven applications and professional services. For more information, please visit www.nuance.com.

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