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(Weymouth, MA) September, 11 2001... The image-rich Web is driving growth in the image server market. As imaging becomes more central to companies' online strategies, image servers are stepping in to help streamline the process of getting images online, while also providing end users with a more visually-compelling experience. A new report from InfoTrends Research Group, "Image Servers Power the Visual Web", profiles image server vendors and sizes the image server market. Online images are fundamental to an increasing number of companies and Web sites. Already, images have become core Internet/intranet features in industries such as e-commerce, auctions, insurance, real estate, security, manufacturing, and construction. Thanks to image servers, new capabilities and efficiencies are being enabled: An online clothing store can let consumers interact with articles of clothing much as they would in a physical store. Users can zoom in on a photo of a sweater to examine its texture, or see how the sweater looks when worn with different pairs of pants. A B2B online exchange of hardware components can automate the process of creating thumbnails of product images, rather than having designers produce them manually. A real estate agent can access a Web-based image database on a handheld device while out in the field, and can submit digital photos for posting to a Web site. "When preparing and deploying a large number of images to the Web, companies are facing problems such as the bandwidth/image quality dilemma, image resizing, and the need to conform to the image display capabilities of disparate viewing devices. These difficulties are being addressed by image servers," says Lia Schubert, research analyst, InfoTrends Research Group. "Before implementing an image server however, companies should clearly identify their specific needs, and carefully consider whether the solution will integrate easily into their existing Web infrastructure." InfoTrends' new report, available immediately, profiles major solutions providers in the emerging image server market including AXS Technologies, Equilibrium, iPIX, LizardTech, MGI Software, PictureIQ, Scene7, True Spectra, and Xippix. The report provides an overview of technology, pricing, current customers, and partners for each vendor. The report also analyzes the drivers and barriers to the implementation of image servers, and provides a top-line market size for image server solutions. |
