VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Nov. 22, 2004 (PRIMEZONE) -- Imagis Technologies Inc. ("Imagis") (OTCBB:IMTIF) (TSX Venture Exchange:WSI) (DE:IGYA) today announces the first sales agreement made possible through its recent partnership with CompuDyne's Public Safety and Justice Unit, Tiburon Inc. of Fremont, CA.
Under the terms of an existing agreement between Tiburon and San Joaquin County, California, Tiburon will deploy an integrated justice system, powered by Imagis' core integration technology -- the Briyante Integration Environment (BIE). The solution builds the foundation of a regional police information sharing system, allowing police officers and investigators to search disparate data repositories across multiple jurisdictions, offering better access to information and improving officer safety.
Agencies initially included in the project include the San Joaquin Sheriff's Department, and the municipal police departments of Stockton, Lodi, Tracy, Escalon and Ripon. Combined, these police agencies are responsible for the public safety of approximately 600,000 residents. Because the Imagis/Tiburon solution can easily scale to include additional data sources, it is planned that other County agencies will eventually become part of the justice information sharing network.
For Imagis, the contract is valued in excess of $250,000 (US).
The Imagis technology facilitates interoperability and information sharing while still allowing participants to maintain control of their own data, a critical requirement in an environment characterized by tight regulations and laws surrounding access to information and privacy. The result is a standards-based web services solution in a Services Oriented Architecture that can easily interoperate with the various and diverse database technologies deployed by justice agencies around the world. Imagis data integration solutions are already providing information sharing benefits to several large police jurisdictions in the United States, including King County, Washington and Contra Costa County, California.
"The Briyante Integration Environment provides a non-proprietary, standards-based, service oriented architecture solution to the historically difficult problem of integrating disparate databases and applications," said Dan Crawford, President & CEO of CompuDyne's Public Safety and Justice unit.
"The San Joaquin project demonstrates the synergy between Tiburon and Imagis, and is an excellent indicator of the market opportunities available through the partnership," said Roy Trivett, CEO of Imagis Technologies. "The combination of Tiburon's strong reputation for delivering law enforcement solutions, and Imagis' expertise with leading edge but proven integration technology, creates a compelling value proposition for existing and new Tiburon customers, who will benefit by being able to realize data sharing objectives better, faster and more economically than ever before."
The advantages of Imagis solutions are being realized by more organizations, not only those involved in the justice sector, but those with a need to share information, interoperate disparate systems, and who need to migrate precious data and business intelligence to newer, more standards-based platforms. The company has an excellent reputation for successful deployments and satisfied customers, and is looking toward a bright future as it expands its offerings to other markets.
About Tiburon
CompuDyne's Public Safety & Justice unit, Tiburon, is an industry-leading provider of automated public safety and justice systems to meet the demanding and complex needs of law enforcement, fire & rescue, corrections and justice environments. CompuDyne (Nasdaq:CDCY) operates within four business units; each with prominent positions in physical and electronic security and technology-based solutions for the public security market. The Public Safety & Justice unit serves government agencies throughout the United States, and is one of the largest companies dedicated to providing automated information solutions for the public safety and justice software market. The Public Safety and Justice unit also provides large-scale inmate management and institutional medical software systems.
About Imagis Technologies
Based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Imagis specializes in developing and marketing software products that enable integrated access to applications and databases. The company also develops solutions that automate law enforcement procedures and evidence handling. These solutions often incorporate Imagis' proprietary facial recognition algorithms and tools. Using industry standard "Web Services", Imagis delivers a secure and economical approach to true, real-time application interoperability. The corresponding product suite is referred to as the Briyante Integration Environment (BIE).
Numerous production deployments of BIE have demonstrated remarkable reductions in the time, complexity, and risk associated with defining, implementing, and supporting integrated access to physically and technologically disparate computers. The broad ranging applicability of BIE into a variety of areas (e.g., health care, financial services, government services, telecommunications, etc.) has been clearly demonstrated by recent, highly-successful deployments in the United States. Imagis booking and facial recognition systems are deployed in Canada, the United Kingdom, United States, Mexico and the Far East.
Imagis is a Microsoft Certified Partner.
For information about Imagis or the company's products and services, please refer to www.imagistechnologies.com.
ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS "Roy Trivett" President and CEO, Imagis Technologies Inc.
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Forward Looking Statements: This press release may contain statements that constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements, to differ materially from the anticipated results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from anticipated results include the risks and uncertainties described in Imagis Technologies Inc.'s Form 10-KSB filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. We disclaim any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.