XEROX SCIENTISTS DEVELOP FIRST GENERIC IMAGE CATEGORISATION TECHNOLOGY

Innovative technology to revolutionise management of images

Under Embargo until 15th November 2004

Grenoble, France - November 15, 2004. Scientists at Xerox Research Centre Europe (XRCE) have developed a system for the categorisation of generic digital images. The program, which effectively ‘recognises’ a photograph of a car, for example, and categorises it, will bring benefits to business applications such as document and content management systems, by allowing users to filter and search for images as well as words. In particular, this technology will bring advantages to customers who need to efficiently store and manage images and it will significantly extend web searching capabilities which are currently based upon text only.

Although there has been a phenomenal growth in the use of digital cameras and images, the use of technology to categorise image content is in its infancy, and is currently only used in applications such as face recognition in the security industry. However, in a breakthrough at XRCE, scientists have developed a generic technique for the identification of images, allowing the categorisation of multiple everyday image content types, such as buildings, animals, airplanes, books and faces. It is the first generic image categorization technology that is simultaneously robust, fast and simple to use.

“Images play a key role in most documents, but in the past document repositories have only been able to search for and categorise text,” says Christopher Dance, senior scientist, image processing, at Xerox Research Centre Europe. “We will be working with Xerox business groups to integrate this new system into Xerox’s document management offerings, making them pioneering products in this field, and providing Xerox customers with additional competitive advantage.”

This breakthrough is a result of fundamental research at XRCE, using Xerox scientists’ expertise in image processing, computer vision and machine learning. The technology works by ‘training’ a computer to map the key features of an object, known as patches, and to classify sets of these patches. This classification in effect assigns an image to a particular category or categories.

However, certain problems had to be overcome. For example, early versions of the system could confuse an image of a stack of tyres and an image of a car, as they both contain some of the same patches. In order to overcome this, the program examines key patches in the context of other areas of the picture. In this example therefore, a stack of tyres would not get confused with a car, because the machine would recognise that it missed other key patches, such as headlights or windows.

By being able to effectively recognise image content, a number of other services can subsequently be applied. For example, if the image recognized is that of a famous building, then the user could ask for more information about it to be automatically retrieved from the web.

Alongside developing this software for different applications, Xerox will continue to extend its categorizer to handle more visual categories and to incorporate difficult cases where the object of interest occupies only a small fraction of the field of view.

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About Xerox Research Centre Europe
Xerox Research Centre Europe (XRCE) guides Xerox research activities in Europe. The centre coordinates research, engineering and the TeXnology Showroom, a customer showcase for Xerox research and a technology exchange forum. The centre is also in charge of developing connections within the wider European scientific community through collaborative projects and partnerships. XRCE creates innovative document technologies for the Xerox office and global solutions and services businesses.

The group focuses on services that help people access and share documents and knowledge, regardless of device, format, platform or language, from the desktop or at a distance. R&D competencies lie in content analysis (natural language), machine learning, document structures, image processing and work practices. XRCE research programs combine results from several research threads to transfer technology applications to the Xerox business groups. Current programs include Office Applications, Work Practice Services and Document Content & Structure.

About Xerox Europe
Xerox Europe, the European operations of Xerox Corporation, markets a comprehensive range of Xerox products, solutions and services, as well as associated supplies and software. Its offerings are focused on three main areas: offices from small to large, production print and graphic arts environments, and services that include consulting, systems design and management, and document outsourcing.

Xerox Europe also has manufacturing and logistics operations in Ireland, the UK and Holland and a research and development facility (Xerox Research Centre Europe) in Grenoble, France. For more information, visit www.xerox.com.

Xerox® is a trademark of Xerox Corporation. All non-Xerox brands and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

XEROX DOCUMENT IMAGING TECHNOLOGY CHANGES THE WAY PEOPLE COMMUNICATE

Under Embargo until 15th November 2004

Grenoble, France, 15th November 2004 – Scientists at Xerox Research Centre Europe (XRCE) have developed document imaging technology for mobile phones that will evolve them into portable document scanners and can, ultimately, turn mobile phones into document service devices. The software has been built upon innovations in improving document imaging with cameras.

Potential business applications of the technology are numerous, but in summary it could revolutionise the roles of employees working remotely in any vertical sector by enabling individuals to capture information and immediately transmit it e.g. from trade events, presentations, forums, client meetings, screens, whiteboards and other situations.

“We saw the potential of mobile telephones as a vehicle for advanced imaging technology from the outset,” explains Chris Dance, senior scientist and image processing manager, XRCE. “However, we had to wait for mobile phone technology to catch up so that the cameras integrated on them were of a high enough resolution. It wasn’t until this year, with the advent of mega-pixel mobile camera phones, that we saw a potential route to market for our technology.”

Mobile document imaging software works through a four-step process. The first step is to capture the image which is immediately corrected for blurring in the second step. This is followed by conversion of the image to black and white, like a conventional printed image in step three. This involves the elimination of any shadows and reflections that it contains. For colour or handwritten text (e.g. on a typical whiteboard) colour saturation and white balance contrast techniques are applied. Finally, the image is compressed to up to a tenth of the size of a JPEG, the compression standard normally employed for mobile image transmission, which it makes possible to easily send and print the document image. The file can be sent by bluetooth, multimedia messaging (MMS) or facsimile. Once the image reaches a server or desktop PC where optical character recognition (OCR) can be applied, various types of services can be offered based upon the user needs.

“The ability to capture the image in a mobile environment, and then transmit that image whilst on-the-move is just the beginning,” continues Dance. “Once this is achieved, then in the future we will be able to apply other Xerox document technologies such as indexing, retrieval or summarisation. Ultimately we will be applying business-to-business document functions to the basic consumer ‘snapshot’ technology and, in doing so, will have changed the way in which people communicate.”

The technology is part of the licensing programme that Xerox has with its agent IPValue Management Inc. “We are currently engaged in a number of business discussions along the value chain for this technology,” explains Mathieu Chuat, Xerox’s European licensing director “from mobile phone manufacturers to vendors of other types of handheld devices, mobile carriers and application providers.”

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About XRCE
XRCE was founded in 1993 to guide Xerox research activities in Europe. The centre coordinates research, engineering and the TeXnology Showroom, a customer showcase for Xerox research and a technology exchange forum. The centre is also in charge of developing connections within the wider European scientific community through collaborative projects and partnerships.

XRCE creates innovative document technologies for the Xerox Office Group and Xerox Global Services. The group focuses on services that help people access and share documents and knowledge, regardless of device, format, platform, or language, from the desktop or at a distance. R&D competencies lie in content analysis (natural language), machine learning, document structures, image processing and work practices. XRCE research programs combine results from several research threads to transfer technology applications to the Xerox business groups. Current programs include Office Applications, Work Practice Services, and Document Content & Structure.

About Xerox Europe
Xerox Europe, the European operations of Xerox Corporation, markets a comprehensive range of Xerox products, solutions and services, as well as associated supplies and software. Its offerings are focused on three main areas: offices from small to large, production print and graphic arts environments, and services that include consulting, systems design and management, and document outsourcing.

Xerox Europe also has manufacturing and logistics operations in Ireland, the UK and Holland and a research and development facility (Xerox Research Centre Europe) in Grenoble, France. For more information, visit www.xerox.com.

Xerox® is a trademark of Xerox Corporation. All non-Xerox brands and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

Xerox Research Centre Europe (XRCE): Media Backgrounder (Work Practice Research Area)

Xerox Research Centre Europe (XRCE) is structured into four complementary research areas: content analysis; document structure; image processing; and work practice technology.

The work practice technology area develops a deep understanding of the use of technology in the work setting. This understanding is used to help develop new technologies and ways of working more productively with them. It is a multi-disciplined group, consisting of field workers and computer scientists and one where the research is based primarily upon ethnographic methods of study and analysis. Field studies cover numerous work domains, with the office being the primary focus of interest.

The research in this area is closely linked to the Xerox Global Services (XGS) business group and Xerox Office Group (XOG). The research provides a much greater understanding to both XGS and all Xerox’s business groups of the structure of its customers’ work which in turn feeds back into Xerox consultancy offerings which are better adapted to customer requirements and their work processes.

The observations in the workplace also enable XRCE to be more innovative with the appropriate technologies in order to help Xerox customers. It is through this observation of customers at work that problems are identified, and the need for such technologies as CopyFinder . For example, portable document camera (PDC) technology was created to solve a common issue in the law business. Lawyers often need to access sections of hard copy text that are too lengthy to re-type, but too short to warrant the time and resources involved in professional scanning and Optical Character Recognition (OCR).

The work practice research group applies a specific and unique methodology to understanding how its customers work. It firstly observes the details by ‘living the work’ themselves. This is known as ethnography, and is significantly different from attempting to analyse customers’ work by merely describing it from the outside.

Xerox is currently the only organisation to take ethnography to its next stage of evolution, namely analytical ethnography. In addition to observing and noting what each customer member of staff does, Xerox then analyses exactly the reasons behind each task, and how it fits in with the overall work processes.

Using the example of a print shop, a scheduler might be described as someone who merely organises what is printed and when. He or she ensures that no printing machines are left idle and, equally, that the print shop is not overrun with work. Using ethnography alone, they might be described as someone who processes certain jobs, completes certain tasks, and meets with certain people.

Making such ethnography analytical takes the process one step further by identifying how the scheduler is able to make the decisions they make. This means it takes into account all the other factors the scheduler assesses: knowledge of the different speeds of each printing machine; knowledge of the individual productivity of each member of personnel in the print shop; knowledge of the quirks of each customer; knowledge of how damp weather conditions might affect the paper; how a late delivery of stock might affect the schedule of print jobs and so on.

Related documentation:

• Work Practice consultancy Toolkit
• Portable Document Camera
• CopyFinder

Separate, individual fact sheets are available on all of these technologies and the business issues they solve (see below).

For more information, please refer to www.xrce.xerox.com or contact...

Getronics’ Service Endorsed by Portman for over €½ million

London – October 27, 2004 - Getronics, one of the UK’s leading ICT solutions and services providers, has secured a further three-year contract with the Portman Building Society, to provide branch support and maintenance for desktop PCs, printers and infrastructure at its 800 seats in all 114 Portman branches.

“We have a strong network of branches,” explains Phil McCabe, CIO, Portman Building Society. “We differentiate ourselves on customer service in these branches and the IT that supports it is therefore crucial. We have worked with Getronics for over a number of years and remain impressed with the support and services that the partnership provides.”

A strong cultural fit between the two organisations helped cement the contract, which includes a powerful service level agreement to ensure Portman’s customer service is never interrupted. Getronics hopes its performance with the Portman will help generate opportunities in the future to support the IT infrastructure of The Staffordshire, a trading name of the Portman, which operates in the West Midlands.

Roger Whitehead, managing director, Getronics UK and Ireland comments: “Organisations in the retail banking sector operate in a fiercely competitive market and need to be assured that they can offer their customers the best service possible for every minute that their branches are open. The service level agreement and support we have offered the Portman will continue to enable them to concentrate on their core business without having to worry about issues around their IT.”

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About Getronics UK & Ireland:
Getronics is one of the UK's leading Information and Communication Technology (ICT) companies, specialising in the financial services and telecommunications markets. With over 1,200 highly skilled employees, Getronics UK is one of the largest of the 30 Getronics subsidiaries worldwide. Through consulting, integrating, implementing and managing infrastructure and business solutions, the company helps many of the world's largest global and local organisations to maximise the value of their technology investment and improve interaction with their customers.

For further information about Getronics UK and Ireland, please visit www.getronics.co.uk

About Portman Building Society:
Portman Building Society has been established for over 150 years tracing its roots back to 1846, making it the third oldest building society in the UK. It is the 4th largest UK building society with assets of over £15.1 billion and employs over 2,000 staff. With some 150 (Portman and The Staffordshire) branches based predominantly in the south of England, the Society serves over 1.8 million members. For further information visit your local branch of the Portman or call 0845 60 90 600. Details are also available at www.portman.co.uk

The Staffordshire is a trading name of Portman Building Society. The brand was created as a result of the merger between Portman Building Society and Staffordshire Building Society, which completed on 31 December 2003. The Staffordshire has 39 branches in the West Midlands and its administrative centre is in Wolverhampton.

For further information contact...

SUN MICROSYSTEMS AWARDS XEROX MULTI MILLION EURO SERVICES PROJECT

Xerox management of Sun’s European print, copy, fax, and multi-function product fleet, delivers ten per cent cost saving in initial stages

Uxbridge, UK and Ballycoolin, Ireland – 21st October 2004 – Xerox today announces it has been awarded a five year, multi million euro international outsourcing services project, by Sun Microsystems. The project will see Xerox assume total responsibility for the management, maintenance, and streamlining of Sun’s entire fleet of printing, copying, faxing and multi-functional products used by the company’s 11,500 total workforce across 119 sites in 31 European countries as well as South Africa. Sun is using Xerox Office Services to reduce printing costs, improve financial administration and service levels as well as boosting its bottom line right across Europe.

Xerox completed an audit of all devices in Sun’s offices, and proposed a rationalisation plan for how to reduce the quantity of those devices and re-deploy them to ensure Sun maximises utility from each individual device. At the same time, Xerox has also taken on the management of Sun’s different European device manufacturers, consumables suppliers and maintenance contracts, as well as assuming sole responsibility for resolving device queries from all Sun employees through its Xerox Global Services support centre in Ballycoolin, Ireland.

“In effect, the initial benefits we’ve seen already are two-fold,” explains Larry Matarazzi, director, Workplace Resources, Sun Microsystems. “Where financial administration is concerned, we’ve gone from having to process over 3,000 invoices per quarter across Europe from all 27 device, consumables and maintenance suppliers, to just one invoice per country per month from Xerox. Secondly, our employees have reported a dramatic improvement in customer service when it comes to device problem resolution across Europe. We set Xerox a target of resolving 80 per cent of issues immediately, but Xerox is actually resolving close to 99.8 per cent, and Sun has already cut its ongoing European print and document management costs by around ten per cent.”

The next step of the project, which has already begun, is the rationalisation of Sun’s device fleet by Xerox. Xerox will continue to deal with every employee query regarding devices – from how to find a printer driver to how to deal with the IT aspects of moving a Sun office to a new site – but simultaneously work to reduce the number of devices that Sun has. In turn, this will reduce the financial burden of the legacy fleet at Sun. In this phase, Xerox has committed to reduce Sun’s print and document management costs in Europe by 25 per cent.

“We have already received dramatic ‘human’ benefits from Xerox’s work in the form of improved morale and better staff productivity,” continues Matarazzi. “In fact, it’s fair to say we started to see the benefit from day one. For the first time we know exactly how many devices we have in these countries. We’re now looking forward to the financial cost savings that will come from having a device fleet and management set-up that will better suit the needs of our European personnel.” Sun is able to make cost savings through using Xerox’s negotiation and buying power for equipment maintenance and other print consumables, as well as increasing productivity and reducing downtime caused by device failure.

“The first part of the project has gone very well from both companies’ points of view,” says Shaun Pantling, director and general manager, Xerox Global Services, Xerox Europe. “As we continue the rationalisation, we will significantly improve Sun’s asset utilisation by increasing the number of users per device from seven to 17 whilst enhancing functionality to increase productivity.”

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NOTES TO EDITORS

About Xerox Europe
Xerox Europe, the European operations of Xerox Corporation, markets a comprehensive range of Xerox products, solutions and services, as well as associated supplies and software. Its offerings are focused on three main areas: offices from small to large, production print and graphic arts environments, and services that include consulting, systems design and management, and document outsourcing.

Xerox Europe also has manufacturing and logistics operations in Ireland, the UK and Holland and a research and development facility (Xerox Research Centre Europe) in Grenoble, France. For more information, visit www.xerox.com.

Xerox®, The Document Company® and the digital X® are trademarks of Xerox Corporation. All non-Xerox brands and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

About Xerox Global Services
Xerox Global Services, one of the three main business units of Xerox, offers a broad portfolio of services including consulting and systems integration, imaging, content management and outsourcing. We work with our clients to improve and manage their document intensive business processes - everyday processes like customer communications, billing, training, or records management.

Xerox®, The Document Company® and the digital X® are trademarks of Xerox Corporation. All non-Xerox brands and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

About Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Since its inception in 1982, a singular vision -- "The Network Is The Computer" -- has propelled Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW) to its position as a leading provider of industrial-strength hardware, software and services that make the Net work. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the World Wide Web at http://sun.com

Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun Logo, Solaris, N1 and The Network Is The Computer are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Products bearing SPARC trademarks are based upon an architecture developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries, exclusively licensed through X/Open Company, Ltd.

Xerox Global Services Makes Sun Shine Brighter

Case study written for Xerox Global Services Europe, October 2004.

When leading IT manufacturer Sun Microsystems wanted to find additional ways to streamline the costs of its document production and management processes, Xerox Global Services rose to the challenge.

Sun Microsystems is renowned globally as a market leader in IT hardware, software, and services. In Europe and South Africa the company operates 119 sites in 31 countries, employing 11,500 people, and had a global revenue of US$11.185 billion in the last fiscal year. Larry Matarazzi, director for Workplace Resources EMEA, Sun Microsystems explains, “Over the last few years Sun has been affected by the global down-turn in the IT sector, with 9/11 and the bursting of the dotcom bubble affecting the technology sector as a whole. Even though there was little ‘new business’ activity at that time, Xerox Global Services approached us proactively with an innovative solution at a time when we needed it most and were already looking to cut costs aggressively. It doesn’t get much better than that.”

Documents represent a huge hidden cost to organisations but they are the lifeblood of business operations, coursing through every PC across every department and across every output device. But research carried out by Xerox Global Services and analyst group IDC indicates that a staggering 90 per cent of European companies cannot even estimate the cost of document processing to their organisation. Xerox Global Services estimates that this figure rests between 5-15 per cent of a company’s annual revenue.

Due to Sun’s understanding of technology, the processes it had in place to deal with managing documents was more advanced than many companies, according to Bernie Gooch, service development manager, Xerox Europe.

“When we first visited Sun and carried out an audit of its document processes, we found that there were seven users per device, which is a lot better than average, but we still found that up to 25 per cent savings could be made,” Gooch explained.

An excess of document processing equipment, such as disparate stand-alone printers, copiers, fax machines and scanners, presents significant maintenance costs and unwanted time burdens on the IT department. These disparate devices can typically be replaced with multifunction devices placed strategically about the office premises. In September 2003, a project commenced to reduce Sun’s total document spend, starting with six key sites across Europe in Camberley, Munich, Dublin, Amersfoort, Berlin and Toulouse. The project was implemented by Xerox Office Services, one of three lines of business within Xerox Global Services.

Across these sites, Xerox Global Services found the following inventory when carrying out its due diligence assessment:

Total Devices 1,744
Suppliers 19
Models 174
Annual Impressions 63.77m

Following its audit, Xerox Global Services proposed a rationalisation plan to reduce the quantity of those devices and reapportion them across the offices to ensure Sun gets the best from each individual device. Xerox Global Services is bound by a service level agreement (SLA) to provide 25 per cent savings on Sun’s print-related costs.

The hidden costs of managing all these devices included warranties and printer disposals, time and material repairs, recycling and unserviceable devices. A lot of devices and consumables were not covered by a service agreement, which presented multiple problems. A solution was needed, as Matarazzi explained.

“We had to decide who would take ownership of the budget as the project fell between IT and facilities management,” he said. Xerox Global Services pitched the project not only to Sun’s IT management and facilities management, but also to Sun’s senior management, and then managed the entire programme from its Ballycoolin site outside Dublin.

The process was guided by Xerox Global Services’ “Lean Six Sigma” techniques for resolving problems. Six Sigma involves five steps to successful project implementation including design of solution, measurement of existing processes, analysis of problem creation, implementation of new solutions and a 12-month period of ‘control’ to assess results.

At the same time, Xerox Global Services has also assumed responsibility for liaising with 27 different European device manufacturers, consumables suppliers, and maintenance contractors whose equipment is still in use at Sun, with the sole responsibility for resolving device queries from all the company’s employees through its Xerox Global Services support centre in Ballycoolin.

The multi million Euro project is already yielding benefits, according to Matarazzi. “In effect, the initial benefits we’ve seen already are two-fold,” he commented. “Where sheer financial administration is concerned, we have gone from having to process over 3,000 invoices per quarter across Europe for all our document or device-related suppliers, to just one invoice per country per month from Xerox Global Services.”

Matarazzi added that Sun’s employees have reported a dramatic impact on customer service when it comes to device problem resolution across Europe. “We set Xerox Global Services a target of resolving 80 per cent of issues immediately, but Xerox Global Services is actually resolving close to 99.8 per cent, and Sun has already cut its ongoing European print costs by around ten per cent,” he said.

Sun has also seen major ‘human’ benefits, such as improved morale and better staff productivity, Matarazzi added. “We are also receiving regular management reports and, again for the first time, are aware exactly how much we are spending on printing documents and maintaining these devices,” he continued. “We’re now looking forward to the financial cost savings that will come from having an optimised fleet and document processes that will better suit the needs of our personnel.”

Xerox Global Services’ aim was to bring the number of users per device up to 17, representing a significant reduction in inventory and releasing office space. As part of the project Xerox Global Services employees are dedicated to assisting Sun, including on site visits to help resolve problems, provide productivity and document consultancy as well as make recommendations. This is in addition to the Xerox Global Services personnel providing technical support at Ballycoolin.

Due to the success – and the gains achieved in the initial stages - of the European project, Sun is now considering using Xerox Global Services to manage its document services globally. Matarazzi concludes: “One of the key reasons why we picked Xerox Global Services for the job in the first place was because it was the only company we felt could deliver in every country we operate in. We’ve had colleagues from the Asia Pacific region on the project team since day one, they are now very interested in using Xerox Global Services in their region too.