Scanbuy Hires Jim Edson as SVP Business Development

NEW YORK, Feb. 21 /PRNewswire/ -- Scanbuy, Inc., (http://www.scanbuy.com/) a global provider of wireless commerce solutions, today announced it has expanded its management team with the addition of Jim Edson as Senior Vice President of Business Development.

A seasoned executive, Jim Edson brings twenty years of global business development experience with a particular focus on mobile solutions that require both mobile handset and mobile carrier collaboration. He will be responsible for relationship-building with mobile handset manufacturers, chipset providers and wireless carriers in his new role.

Prior to joining Scanbuy, Edson was SVP of business development at PacketVideo Corporation, the world's leading provider of embedded multimedia software and applications. At PacketVideo he focused on new applications, developing new markets, and nurturing relationships with global carriers and handset OEMs. Previously, Edson held various sales, marketing and general management positions with several major wireless vendors including Motorola, Qualcomm and Ericsson,

Edson's career includes successful long-term expatriate assignments in Japan, South Asia and Latin America. He was a co-founder and board member of a PCS operator in Chile and a fixed wireless service provider in Brazil.

Barcodeproject Amsterdam Museum Night

Visitors to tonights Amsterdam Museum Night may notice a barcode near various artworks. Those who take a picture of that barcode with their cellular and send it to the given emailaddress will receive additional background information about the artwork.

The Amsterdam Historic Museum, the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Rembrandthouse and Nemo are among the six that participate in this barcodeproject. Each of them selected five objects. [via Smart Mobs via emerce]

Trident: Tamagotchi meets Barcode Battler?

Earlier this month, Preamble Corp. released Trident, a virtual pet game for camera phones.

Players feed their virtual pets by scanning QR codes. Then, in "battle mode," the pets fight with each other. In order to win a battle, players should feed thier pets the right food (or QR code) and thereby raising/strenghening the pets and collecting key items. For example, if a fight can last long, you may want to feed lots of good food before the fight.

More wonderful barcodes

A video of whimsical barcodes from Japan's Design Barcode, Inc. that won the Titanium Lion for Design at the Cannes Lions 2006, 53rd International Advertising Festival. [via digg]

As of today, 15 companies are utilizing Design Barcodes in their packaging, and approximately 60 kinds of Design Barcodes are circulating in the marketplace. There have been zero instances of false readings resulting from these barcodes.

Airlines look at mobile phone boarding passes

By 2010 UK airline passengers could be checking in and boarding flights using an electronic barcode transmitted to their mobile phone, industry experts predict. [via Computing]

"Airlines including British Airways and Virgin Atlantic are considering mobile technology as an alternative to traditional magnetic strip-based boarding passes."

Shopping by cellphone has a few kinks

ScanBuy Shopper, on the other hand, casts a massive net. It scours Amazon Marketplace, PriceGrabber, Shopping.com and Yahoo Shopping for prices, and it finds some real steals.

Bottom line: Mobile price comparison systems leave much to be desired, but I'd still recommend Frucall and ScanBuy (if your phone supports it).

Under the right circumstances, both of these free services can answer a question that has plagued shoppers for a decade now: "I wonder if I could get this cheaper online?"

SO MANY CHOICES

SERVICE	PRO	CON
Frucall	Normal voice call	Results take longer to say than read
ScanBuy Shopper	Searches several sites	Won't work on many phones
Mobsaver	Easy to text barcode	Searches only two sites
Froogle SMS	Uses keywords, not numbers	Can return wrong product
Pronto	Full search, good bargains	Very slow on phone

Barcode Recognition in Flash

As part of my new year, I’ve decided to start putting more code out there earlier. I have a tendency to build projects in private, trying to get things perfect before I reveal them publicly. The end result is that I have a lot of code gathering dust in the corners of my hard drive. No more. That’s why I’m going to post one of the mini-projects I’ve been working on for the last little while: a Flash-based barcode recognition library.

I know what you’re thinking: Why the heck would anyone want to build a Flash-based barcode recognition library? Why not try the demo yourself and see!

The idea is simple: allow use of a commodity webcam as a barcode reader, thus allowing users to efficiently input physical items into web-based applications. Using digital cameras as a cheap alternative to traditional barcode scanners isn’t an original idea - Delicious Library uses iSight to allow its users to input their CDs, DVDs, and other media into a personal media library. Unfortunately, that particular application is a heavy application that’s only available on the Mac - what I want to do is build a simple way to provide that same kind of functionality in platform independent web-based applications.

More here

DuPont Packaging & Industrial Polymers & Scanbuy to Bring Interactive Packaging Technology to the Packaging Industry

EW YORK, Feb. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- Scanbuy, Inc., (http://www.scanbuy.com/) a global provider of wireless commerce solutions today announced an exclusive agreement with DuPont Packaging & Industrial Polymers (P&IP) (http://www.dupont.com/) to license Scanbuy's interactive 2D (two dimensional) barcode technology for packaging applications. As a part of the agreement, DuPont P&IP will be the exclusive marketer of Scanbuy's interactive camera-phone technology to the packaging industry.

DuPont P&IP selected Scanbuy as its exclusive technology provider to commercialize and market Scanbuy's interactive technology to select global brands under the DuPont banner. When imbedded in product packaging, 2D barcode technology enables a myriad of consumer interactive applications directly from mobile handsets. Some potential uses in packaging are checking nutritional content of food & beverages or determining if a cosmetic is suited for you, and more sophisticated uses like playing games & winning prizes.

"Smart packaging represents a key future packaging trend and opens up new opportunities that run the gamut from better inventory tracking to brand enhancement," said Dr. John Hillenbrand, Vice President, Innovation and Technology for DuPont P&IP business unit. "We chose to partner with Scanbuy because their barcode-capture technology and services platforms are clearly more advanced and robust than others in the market."

More here

A little light on Neomedia vs Abaxia is shed

The plot thickens

By Tony Dennis: Tuesday 20 February 2007, 21:15

HAVING PUBLISHED the rumour that French software house, Abaxia, was thinking of suing arch rival, Neomedia Technologies, over bar code technology, the INQ has been deluged with requests for more information.

Sadly, we haven't been able to get either side to comment as yet. But there is some light that we can shed on the matter.

There are definitely moves ahead to create a global standard for mobile bar-coding.

As Neomedia recently stated,"We are also making great strides to create a global standard for the wireless Web and have scheduled a high-level meeting in London this month [February] with some of the world's leading technology firms to begin to define and document this important standards-based initiative."

It also said, "We envision a future in which consumers routinely "qode it" when they want more information on a product or service."

The company obviously wants to establish its own brand – Qode- as the standard name for this kind of behaviour. Just as photocopying was once called 'Xeroxing'.

The fly in the ointment is that Abaxia and its existing customerbase, which includes several leading mobile operators, don't reckon that Neomedia can actually patent the technology in Europe.

In Europe you can't patent something which people have been doing for ages, just because you're the first to the patent office with an application form.

More here

Upwardly Mobile: Where are all the QRs?

Ever heard of QR codes? No? Neither have many other people in the UK, apparently. Jo Best explains all about the many uses of this quirky mobile tech from - where else - Japan.

In the last Upwardly Mobile column, I called for smarter use of cameraphones - more business applications, less taking drunk pictures of your mates.

As usual it seems the cradle of mobile civilisation, Japan, has found and deployed a system to take advantage of cameraphones which is being embraced by retailers and consumers alike. It's called 'QR codes'.

Scanbuy Awarded Two Patents for Decoding and Enhancing Barcodes for Mobile Devices

Scanbuy, Inc., (http://www.scanbuy.com/) a global provider of wireless commerce solutions today announced it has been granted two U.S. patents. The first patent addresses a method for decoding and analyzing barcodes using a mobile device to transmit and access information via WAP, SMS, or MMS. The second is focused on a system that provides an algorithm designed to enhance images of barcodes to facilitate the decoding process.

US Patent No. 7,156,311, describing a system for decoding barcodes using a mobile device like a cell phone equipped with a digital camera, uses software located on the mobile device to enhance the barcode image and subsequently decode the barcode information. The software uses the camera to read the barcode, transmit the decoded information to a server in multiple ways such as WAP, SMS, or MMS, and then connects the device via a wireless network to the corresponding media content and/or information.

U.S. patent No. 7,168,621 named "section based algorithm for image enhancement" provides a process for enhancing images of barcodes that can compensate for many shortcomings of camera-equipped mobile devices, allowing many more images captured by camera-phones to be decoded, and as a result enhances users' decoding experience.

"The patents we've been granted demonstrate the depth and strength of Scanbuys, ever growing, IP portfolio, and, more importantly, help to position Scanbuy as the partner of choice for handset manufacturers, carriers, content providers and advertisers," said Jonathan Bulkeley, Chief Executive Officer of Scanbuy, Inc.

Scanbuy Signs Global Partnership Agreement with Nokia to Provide Mobile Marketing Software on Handsets

New York, NY, February 7, 2007- Scanbuy, Inc., (http://www.scanbuy.com/) a global provider of wireless commerce solutions, today announced a global partnership agreement with Nokia (http://www.nokia.com/), the world’s largest mobile phone manufacturer, to preload Scanbuy’s mobile marketing software on Nokia handsets. The Greater China region (China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau) will be the first of a planned multi-market rollout for Nokia and Scanbuy, Inc.
The Scanbuy technology will allow users of the Nokia S60 and S40 handsets to recognize and decode barcodes on products, media and advertising and to link directly to content and services from their handsets.
“We are thrilled to team up with Nokia to bring our technology to the largest mobile market and eventually the rest of the world,” said Jonathan Bulkeley, Chief Executive Officer of Scanbuy, Inc. “Within the next 24 months we expect 2D barcodes to become ubiquitous within Greater China as marketers and media deploy codes on all products and advertising.”
According to Informa Telecoms and Media, the global mobile market is expected to reach almost 3 billion by the year 2010 with Asia, the Middle East and Africa experiencing the highest growth rates. The new mobile user is seeking a more personal and context-sensitive experience. 1D and 2D bar code technology provides a seamless experience to navigate the physical world using a camera phone. Consumers can scan for product information on price, availability, features, rebates, special offers or similar products. Consumers can also scan embedded information in product advertisements and catalogs, create shopping lists, purchase items or link to the Web for more information.