"Today's companies are facing increasing external connections with partners, suppliers, customers and other outside resources," said Punch Networks' president and CEO. "As these connections grow in number, so does the need to effectively, securely and accurately communicate. Current solutions, like email, only address part of the issue. What is needed is not only secure and accessible data storage, but also tools and services to help users manage changing files and information. Companies now have the option of letting us host the service for them, or installing it on their own system."

Punch was one of the first companies to offer a hosted, Web-based file storage and collaboration service. It is now one of the first to offer a product version of its ASP service. "Although we've taken extraordinary measures to ensure the security of our hosted service, we also have heard from our customers that the ability to host the service themselves would be attractive," continued Punch Networks' president and CEO "So we've responded by making the WebGroups software available as a product to address hosting and data control issues."

"WebGroups proved its value to us during the months we accessed it from Punch's site," said Antonio Martin, senior project manager at Meridium, Inc., a software developer. Meridium was one of Punch's early customers for WebGroups Enterprise after using the hosted service for six months to collaborate on documents internally as well as with their clients, which include six of the top 10 petrochemical companies in the world.

"We would have continued using it from their site had they not made WebGroups Enterprise available. But as a matter of policy, we try to keep as many applications and as much of our corporate data as possible behind our firewall, so we chose to license the WebGroups Enterprise software." The hosted version, WebGroups Enterprise ASP, is ideally suited for small and medium sized businesses, or departments within large enterprises. With no software to download or install, and no back-end integration, Enterprise ASP produces immediate results.

Store, share and update files from the Web
Whether users access WebGroups Enterprise from Punch's site or from their own, the experience is the same. A single user or a collection of users creates a WebGroup (a secure page on a Web server) where they can securely store, distribute and update files using just their Web browser. Any time a user changes a document and uploads it to the WebGroup, the system notifies the other members of that WebGroup via email that the document has changed. The other members can then come to the site and download the new version of the file directly to their machine, automatically updating the existing version.

Importantly, Punch WebGroups uploads and downloads only the information that changes between versions of a document, so updates occur quickly. The site is password-protected, and files are encrypted on the server. Because the service is Web-based, users can access their files from any Internet-enabled machine. The server has advanced functionality, including:

• Update status: Upon logging in to a WebGroup account, the Punch WebGroups server checks the user's machine to see if the files he or she has locally are up-to-date. On a file-by file basis, the User Interface displays whether or not the user has the current version of the file. If the user is out of date, all it takes is one click to update the file on the user's machine.
• Version tracking and management: The WebGroups server stores all published versions of a file, which means any user can at any time download any version of a file. Because Punch WebGroups sends only the changes between versions, it also stores only the changes. So when a user downloads a previous version of a file, only the changes between the version selected and the version on the hard drive are sent across the Web.
• Audit trail: At any time, a user can check to see which other users have joined the WebGroup and whether or not they have downloaded a file. The User Interface also displays the time that each user was last updated.
• Administrative Tools: Administrators have a full suite of tools that lets them track user activity, enable/disable accounts, set user authorities, regulate access to the site, and perform other tasks.

System Requirements

Punch WebGroups Enterprise
To run Punch WebGroups Enterprise on their own network, companies will need the following: Microsoft NT Server 4.0 SP 4; Microsoft IIS 4.0; Microsoft SQL Server 6.5 SP 5a; Microsoft Exchange Server 5.5 SP 2 with LDAP (Directory) Site and SMTP services enabled; and Microsoft Proxy Server 2.0 with a Reverse Proxy Configuration.

Punch WebGroups Enterprise ASP
The WebGroups Enterprise ASP service can be accessed with just a Web browser. Punch customizes the "front-end" to reflect the identity of the company, including color schemes and logo placements. With the package, companies receive their own Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protected site with their own permanent URL (Universal Resource Locator). Additionally, the service supports group billing and quota setting. By leveraging Punch's application programming interface (PAPI), companies have numerous options for creating access points for their service. And because the service is hosted by Punch and uses standard Hypertext Transfer Protocol (http) ports, IT administrators do not need to modify their firewalls.

About Punch Networks Corporation
Founded by David Campbell in 1995, Punch Networks develops software and services that help people effectively manage changing digital information. The company's flagship product, Punch WebGroups, lets anyone securely store, share and automatically update their files with just a Web browser. Punch Networks offers the Punch WebGroups service from its own site as well as co-branded versions of the service from more than a dozen vertical portal sites, including, building and construction (e-architect.com, plandepot.com), education (powerstudents.com, pureadvice.com), legal (casecentral.com, e-attorney.com, justicelink.com, serengetiUS.com), business research (intellifact.com), small business services (centerbeam.com, epanacea.com) and mechanical engineering (alibre.com). It also offers the service direct to companies as a hosted service or as a product for intranet and extranet use.

For more information, visit the Punch Networks website at www.punchnetworks.com, email info@punchnetworks.com, or call (206) 343-7661.