ZDNet UK


Skip to Main Content

ZDNet.co.uk - Winner of Best Business Website 2007
  1. Home
  2. News
  3. Blogs
  4. Reviews
  5. Prices
  6. Resources
  7. Community
  8. My ZDNet

 

ZDNet UK RSS Feeds


IT Jobs

Office applications Toolkit

Email-search software update adds dates

David Becker CNET News.com

Published: 15 Jun 2004 12:05 BST

  • Email
  • Trackback
  • Clip Link
  • Print friendly
  • Post Comment

Software start-up Stata Labs on Monday released the first major revision of its Bloomba email software, adding calendar features and the ability to swap data with Palm devices.

Stata unveiled the initial version of Bloomba about a year ago, positioning the software as an alternative to Microsoft's widespread Outlook for people who need to manage huge libraries of saved messages.

Instead of relying on folder structures and other tricks to organise saved messages, Bloomba has a built-in search engine that usually finds what the customer is looking for in a couple of seconds, Stata chief executive Ron Brown said.

"The difference between Bloomba and other email clients is that this is designed from the ground up around search," he said. "The typical customer for Bloomba has tens of thousands of messages in their in-box. They save everything for a variety of reasons... Some just can't hit the delete key."

Bloomba 2.0, available now, beefs up the software with a calendar application and new search functions. The "professional" version of the program adds support for synchronising data with handheld computers running the Palm operating system and an enhanced calendar that allows users to swap appointment information via the Web. Bloomba Personal Edition sells for $60 (£33); the Professional Edition is $90.

Brown said the calendar and Palm synchronisation additions answer the two biggest concerns customers had about the initial Bloomba release. "Those are areas that are pretty basic, and if you don't have it, people have to find something else," he said. "Some of our customers were running two email clients side by side."

Brown declined to reveal sales figures but said Bloomba has attracted thousands of users, despite competing with a product most customers already have as part of Microsoft's Office package.

"Sure, Outlook is free if you have Office... and we charge for our product, but that hasn't been an obstacle," Brown said. "We thought it would be, but it's been the biggest non-issue of all our assumptions. People will pay for software that makes it easier for them to get their work done."

  • Email
  • Trackback
  • Clip Link
  • Print friendly
  • Post Comment

Did you find this article useful?
55 out of 100 people found this useful


Full Talkback thread

0 comments

Company/Topic Alerts

Create a new alert from the list below:







Featured Talkback

Why do so many (virtually all) software packages think that they are so important that they have to be started automatically every time the computer boots? What is the largest number of "speed access", "update check", "camera download" and whatever other background programs you have ever seen running? Of those, how many did you really need?

By: J.A. Watson

Read full story:
Annoying software: a rogues' gallery

Discussions

stl_saint stl_saint

a smart one

Friday 22 August 2008, 2:24 AM

4 comments
1000262163 1000262163

Time the law was applied!

Thursday 21 August 2008, 9:51 PM

1 comment

Vista Upgrade Blog

Official MS Windows 7 Bloggers

Check this out: http://blogs.msdn.com/e7...spx Its an official blog "Engineering Windows 7" Nothing. That's what is revealed. Until there is real... More

5 comments

Microsoft's Mojave just a desert vista

It didn't seem fair to wade into Microsoft's “Mojave Experiment” advert quite so soon after the flat earth incident. But The Economist has no such qualms: in this week's issue, it wonders... More

6 comments

... But Still a Few Things Amiss (with...

It's not all roses with Vista, of course. I had my first BSOD over the weekend, when I was turning the laptop back on after suspending it. They typical long blurb about "If this is... More

6 comments