[December 17, 2003] StrongMail Launches Industry's First Enterprise Email Application Server Frank Addante made his name building high-scale marketing and email technology applications. (He invented adMonitor, the groundbreaking Net marketing technology that, at its peak, delivered 8 billion banner ads and e-mail messages a month for more than 3,000 blue-chip companies.) But now Addante and his team have a new mission -- not to provide email applications, but rather to provide the building blocks that enable businesses to build their own enterprise-grade email applications -- quickly, easily and cost-effectively. Addante is co-founder and CEO of StrongMail Systems, a Los Angeles-based email technology firm that recently launched the industry's first email application server, the fruit of nearly two years and 20,000+ engineering hours of development and customer trials. Addante feels confident that it's been worth the effort, and that this new category for email technology ("email application servers") will be a turning point for enterprise email communications, which have become increasingly burdensome to consumers -- and, in turn, less effective for businesses. "The days of `batch-and-blast' emails need to be over. Not only is it ineffective, it's irresponsible," says Addante. "Innovative businesses understand how to use email to communicate more effectively with their customers, but until now they simply haven't had the right software to get there." According to Addante, StrongMail provides the missing piece of the puzzle: a fully integrated platform that supports the types of applications businesses need to power dynamic, value-adding, profitable customer communications (like ticketing, billing, sports updates, loyalty programs, etc.) -- apps that currently require major investments of time and money to develop. The StrongMail Enterprise email application server knocks down these hurdles, enabling businesses to easily blend and create innovative email applications using powerful "building blocks" for fast mail merges, dynamic content and flexible tracking -- all powered by a highly scalable infrastructure. One of the keys is a software development kit that makes it fast and easy for businesses to tap into existing assets (like user databases, CRM systems, content management and reporting systems, etc.), and use this information to shape deeply dynamic communications. "Even though email is the killer app of the Internet, email applications today are far from mature," adds Addante. "We're basically doing for email applications development what was done for website development years ago. In 1997, most company sites were simple online brochures, just like most enterprise-to-consumer email messages are today. That's because dynamic sites cost so much and took so much time to develop. Then website development software came into the market, and now your kid brother or sister can create a professional-looking, dynamic site in an afternoon. That was a real revolution -- and that's where we're leading our industry." It's a simple enough concept, but the execution of a solid, workable email application server has proven elusive, leaving businesses with two options for communicating with customers via email -- 1) outsource their direct marketing messages to ASPs, and/or 2) pour time and money into developing custom "freeware"-based solutions for every new email initiative that requires integration with existing CRM or commerce systems. The level of pain that businesses have endured in this area can be gauged by StrongMail's strong market entry. The company has hit the ground running, quickly inking deals with top-tier corporate customers since its recent launch. Part of StrongMail's buzz has been generated by its message delivery software, which lets clients reliably deliver up to 1,000,000 messages an hour on a standard server. But Addante is quick to point out that scalability is just a first step -- a required means to an end. "So far, the industry has been focused on delivery speed, as opposed to delivery substance, and the result is a volatile, inefficient, spam-cluttered market. Scalable delivery is just one of the many building blocks that StrongMail provides. It's about solid infrastructure and smart software -- the keys that will let smart companies unlock the potential of email to win more customers, provide better service, cut costs, generate new revenues -- just do better business across the board." [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]