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Brandon-Hall.Com Recognizes New SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0 In LMS KnowledgeBase ReportMOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. --(Business Wire)-- Jan. 6, 2005 -- Leading learning industry analyst firm calls new learning and business performance solution "easy enough to use for literally any setting" SumTotal(TM) Systems (Nasdaq:SUMT), the industry's largest provider of learning and business performance technologies, services and processes, today announced that leading learning research and advisory firm, brandon-hall.com has profiled the new SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0 in its report, "LMS KnowledgeBase: In-Depth Profiles of 50 Learning Management Systems, with Custom Comparison Across 200+ Features." The analyst firm, one of the earliest in the industry to see SumTotal 7.0, concluded that "the system is ideally suited for large-scale, enterprise implementations, but is easy enough to use for literally any setting." The brandon-hall.com LMS KnowledgeBase provides extensive profiles of the 50 learning technology providers most commonly identified by organizations making LMS purchasing decisions. Eight expert reviewers evaluated the providers and their technologies on more than 370 criteria, including product specifications, standards, assessments, tracking and reporting capabilities, pricing, product support and corporate structure and viability, among others. In their comprehensive evaluation of SumTotal 7.0, the reviewers commented, "With the merger of Click2learn and Docent (creating SumTotal as a new entity), there was considerable speculation about the direction the new company would take with their contrasting, yet similar-in-purpose, technologies. With this review, we were literally one of the first to review the new LMS solution in action. What we discovered is that the new offering isn't just 'the best of Aspen meets Docent;' rather, SumTotal commendably took this opportunity to apply 'lessons learned' from both companies and to create something robust and brand new." SumTotal expects a wide variety of product innovations to set the SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0 apart in the marketplace. They include: -- Web Services, which provide unparalleled interoperability with organizations' existing, heterogeneous technological environments; -- Open Activity Architecture (OAA), a next-generation functionality that allows for streamlined management of blended learning, learning plans and courses from a single access point. -- Dynamic Domains, which enables learning management of individuals grouped by "domain," according to job role, corporate division or other characteristic. -- Embedded LMS Reporting Capabilities, which provide in-depth, dynamic reporting functionality and a unique reporting framework out of the box. Commenting on the SumTotal Suite's new integration framework and extensive use of Web Services, the report says, "We discovered that the new architecture of the underlying infrastructure provides easier access and connectivity to back-office systems than either of their previous LMS solutions." The review also commends the new Dynamic Domains functionality in SumTotal 7.0, stating, "..... we very much liked the model employed in the system for creating multiple domains (learning portals for different departments or divisions) from a single implementation of the system. SumTotal LMS has a visual interface that allows you to see and quickly move about the hierarchy as a super user, changing look and feel, portal properties, and business rules for each derivative portal." The profile goes on to recognize a wide range of additional features and functionalities in SumTotal 7.0, including strong performance and classroom management, standards support and collaboration capabilities. Brandon-hall.com's LMS KnowledgeBase sums up its SumTotal 7.0 overview by concluding, "(The system) is definitely worth considering if you are planning a sophisticated back-office integration using Web services. It should be strongly considered for those with extensive HCM/performance management needs. It is also one of only a few systems that offer LMS, LCMS, and virtual classroom capabilities from a single vendor." "Because they were among the first outside our company to see SumTotal 7.0 and to put it through rigorous evaluation even before it was released, we were particularly interested in what brandon-hall.com's team of reviewers had to say about the suite," said Andy Eckert, SumTotal CEO. "That SumTotal 7.0 received such a positive evaluation across so many criteria is a testament to the hard work of our development teams and SumTotal's years of expertise gained from working with customers to help ensure their business success. We continue to receive enthusiastic response to SumTotal 7.0 from customers, partners and analysts and we are fully confident that SumTotal 7.0 will be the market-leading solution in the learning industry." For the full SumTotal profile, or more information on the brandon-hall.com LMS KnowledgeBase, visit www.brandon-hall.com. For more information about the new SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0, or to learn about upgrading, please visit www.sumtotalsystems.com or phone 1-866-SMTOTAL. About the SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0 Providing unparalleled breadth in application and depth in business functionality, the SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0 is the industry's most comprehensive, globally scalable learning and business performance offering, and the only one to combine learning management, learning content management, in-depth analytics and other mission-critical, standards-based learning applications on a single, integrated platform. SumTotal 7.0 promises more flexible, rapid, strategic delivery and management of learning activities; unprecedented options for measuring learning impact on revenues, expenses, cycle time and other business results; and unique interoperability and integration capabilities that dramatically reduce the cost of ownership. About SumTotal Systems SumTotal Systems Inc. (Nasdaq:SUMT) is the business performance and learning technology industry's largest single provider of technologies, processes and services. Formed by the merger of industry pioneers Docent and Click2learn, the company is uniquely focused on helping organizations harness and manage mission-critical intellectual power to solve real-world business problems and produce significant bottom-line results. SumTotal has helped accelerate performance and profit for more than 675 of the world's best-known companies and federal and local government agencies, including Microsoft, AT&T, US Army, Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard, Vodafone, Lucent, Accenture, Cendant, Harley-Davidson, Wyeth, Wachovia and D & B. SumTotal Systems is headquartered in Mountain View, CA, with offices throughout the US, as well as in London, Paris, Heidelberg, Sydney, Tokyo and Hyderabad, India. Safe Harbor Statement/ Forward-Looking Statements "Information in this press release contains forward-looking statements. These statements represent SumTotal Systems' expectations or beliefs concerning future events and include statements, among others, regarding SumTotal Systems' new product, SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0. These statements are not historical facts or guarantees of future performance or events and are based on current expectations, estimates, beliefs, assumptions, goals and objectives, and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to be materially different from the results expressed or implied by these statements. Readers of this press release are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements. Additional factors that could cause actual results to differ include, but are not limited to (i) unknown errors or bugs in SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0; (ii) unexpected shipment problems or delays of SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0; (iii) customers or partners delaying purchasing decisions; (iv) the acceptance of SumTotal Enterprise Suite 7.0 and future product offerings; (v) the ability to successfully implement SumTotal System's solutions; (vi) the ability to successfully address technological developments and standards; (vii) ability to successfully manage growth, significant current and expected additional competition, and the need to continue to expand product distribution and services offerings; and (viii) other events and other important factors disclosed previously and from time to time in SumTotal Systems' filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the quarterly report filed on Form 10Q on November 15, 2004. SumTotal Systems assumes no obligation to update the information in this press release." |
