Office automation software supplier Quadratron Inc is seeking to raise its profile, and accordingly laid out a series of new products and future directions at its first UK press conference the other day. Heading the list were PC-DOS and VAX/VMS versions of Q-Office release 1.95, the version that is claimed to reduce CPU usage by 405 to 50% compared with previous versions, enabling close to double the number of users to be supported on a given configuration. Both the PC-DOS and VAX/VMS versions ship this month, and other features of 1.95 include full support for Xenix and 386-based machines, Document Content Architecture support, and the ability to handle laser printers and phototypesetters using the Adobe PostScript page description language. The accompanying Q-Typeset subsystem enables scanned images to be merged with text; images can be scaled and sized, and it provides optional font libraries. Also announced was Q-CBT, a series of training modules for Q-Office+, Q-Office, and Q-One users under PC-DOS; Q-CBT for other products and versions are due later. Quadatron is looking to the integration of office automation software with PABXs as the next growth area; it is looking for the PABX to come out on top in the market as the preferred backbone of office automation systems and is particularly pleased at being picked by British Telecom to provide the software accompanying its recently launched Mezza workstation. Not surprisingly, it is also looking for a greater degree of voice integration, extending the current capability for voice store and forward and annotation said to be built into the product. The company already claims its software – which more often than not appears from OEM customers under another name – is already installed at a wide range of Government departments and large organisations including the Cabinet Office and Prime Minister’s office, the Central Computer & Telecommunications Agency, British Petroleum, British Telecom and London’s Metropolitan Police. The Pedder Associates 1987 Integrated Office Systems report reckoned that Quadatron had more than 40% of the UK office systems market in the segment for systems with five to 24 users, with just under 1,000 licences and an estimated 10,000 workstation users – but UK software house Uniplex (ne’e Redwood) was estimated to have about three and a half times as many licences in the field, with over 16,000 workstations, mainly on smaller systems.
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