Sports Fans Stay Always Connected with MIDAS

Gieten, The Netherlands, November 29 2007 - Appear announced today that the MIDAS (Middleware Platform for Developing and Deploying Advanced Mobile Services) consortium had successfully deployed the first version of its wireless platform for sports events at the annual Superprestige Cyclocross event in Gieten. The MIDAS Consortium is composed of leading IT vendors and research organizations focusing on mobile technologies.

The Superprestige Cyclocross race of Gieten gathered over 6,000 visitors over 2 days. The solution consisted of Smartposition GPS sensors, given to the race contestants, and MIDAS context-aware middleware deployed on tablet PCs in the race command centre, and on Nokia hand-held mobile devices. With the help of NOC*NSF (Dutch Olympic Committee), Capgemini deployed and configured the system, which enabled live tracking of the contestants by visitors and officials.

Henk Karman, project coordinator at NOC*NSF, comments: “Spectators and race officials can only see individuals going past checkpoints on the road, but most of the time, they have no idea how the race is developing off-road, in the forest. MIDAS made it possible to provide real-time information on the contestants, such as groups and gaps, in locations and situations where previously this would have been impossible”.

The MIDAS platform makes it commercially viable for the wider IT industry to provide mobile services in environments where there is a large number of users over a limited period of time (for example an international sports event such as the Football World Cup), or where the service has to be set up at very short notice (for example, teams responding to an emergency in a underground transportation network).

The key differentiator of the MIDAS approach is that information is replicated in several local ”nodes” in the network (a node can be one of the mobile devices). This “peer-to-peer” approach allows the solution to be resilient to network outages. MIDAS also supports “context sensitivity”, meaning that information made available on a particular device is automatically determined from the profile of the user (e.g. slightly different information for spectators and race officials). Commercial deployment of the platform is planned for late 2008.

“We are very satisfied with this first live test” commented Joe Gorman, project manager, SINTEF. “It showed the versatility of our approach, and convincingly demonstrated that our first prototype works in real-life conditions. It also gave us the detailed feedback we need to make refinements for robustness and extended functionality. With MIDAS, we are talking about cutting the development time of services from months to weeks, and providing innovative mobile services to thousands of sports fans at the same time”.

About MIDAS
The MIDAS consortium includes SINTEF, a leading European research institute and project coordinator; Capgemini, a global system integrator; Telefonica, one of the world’s largest telecom operators; RATP, the Paris public transport authority; Appear Networks, a mobile middleware specialist; NOC*NSF, the Dutch Olympic Committee, University of Oslo and Warsaw University of Technology. For further information please visit www.ist-midas.org

About Appear
Appear is the leading provider of context-aware software infrastructure designed to power the next generation of mobile applications and services. Using situational information (context), the AppearIQ suite of products transforms ordinary wireless data networks into rich multimedia channels that deliver information, voice, video and messages to mobile computer users. By collecting and sharing context, Appear’s solutions eliminate information overload and ensure users have exactly the information they need, when and where they need it. With Appear software, devices and applications react in real-time to users’ changing needs. Industry leaders in transportation, retail, telecommunications and government use AppearIQ. Appear has an extensive partner network including industry leaders Cisco and Intel who along with vertical market specialists work to deliver innovative, end-to-end wireless and mobile solutions. The company is privately held and headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden and with offices across Europe. For further information please visit www.appearnetworks.com

Press Contact Appear:
Mia Falgard, +46 8 545 91 370
mia.falgard@appearnetworks.com