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PSS Systems Unveils Distributed Document Policy Enforcement Solution to Increase Security and Corporate Compliance
Experienced Management Team Raises $30 Million And Gains Substantial Industry Backing
PALO ALTO, California, November 3, 2003 — PSS Systems, Inc., a pioneer in policy management and compliance solutions for distributed documents, today announced PSS1™, a solution that enables organizations to ensure compliance with industry regulations, risk management initiatives and retention policies. With PSS1, organizations can centrally create, manage, and enforce a broad range of policies across all documents, including mobile, distributed documents. By automating complex record management processes, the PSS solution results in consistent policy enforcement across an organization and reduces the cost of compliance over earlier methods.
The company is also announcing today that Cap Gemini Ernst & Young Government Services has adopted PSS1 for protecting and tracking confidential project files and ensuring secure communication with public sector clients. Backed by $30 million in funding from leading venture and corporate investors, PSS Systems is led by Founder, Chairman, and CEO Alain Rossmann, who played founding roles in many successful technology companies, including Openwave, EO, C-Cube, and Radius.
Pressing Need for Information Control and Compliance
New industry regulations, corporate governance legislation, homeland security concerns, and the need for securing intellectual property require that organizations be able to track and enforce document policies with 100% compliance. Prior solutions that left the protection and control of documents in the hands of individual users have resulted in sporadic compliance and a multitude of internal policy breaches. The increasing need for information-sharing between partners -- as critical business processes such as R&D are outsourced -- as well as collaboration between government agencies in the fight against terrorism — mandates global and distributed policy enforcement wherever the documents go.
Document policies must also address the fact that aging corporate records and information assets can become a substantial liability. Companies have to balance new regulatory requirements to retain records with the ongoing liability and legal exposure that outdated records represent. Organizations must be able to automate the enforcement of their policies to control the costs associated with the explosion of regulations and risk management initiatives, as well as to guarantee compliance.
Product Description and Features
The PSS1 software is an enterprise solution that allows organizations to create, manage and enforce document policies for records and sensitive data. The PSS product automatically applies and enforces policies across distributed documents - even copies located outside the corporate network on partner systems, home PCs and removable or back-up media. It is the first system to do so under a centrally-managed set of rules that completely takes the onus off of individual users from knowing or implementing the policy, which drives compliance way down. Policy changes can also be applied retroactively to existing documents automatically and transparently to users by the system. This automatic, consistent enforcement of the policy increases compliance and dramatically reduces costs when compared to prior record management and retention procedures that were typically manual and ad hoc.
The PSS1 system’s central server, or Policy Authority, forms the main hub for the centralized policy definition, including user and group definitions and document classifications. A middle tier of local servers acts as a data cache for policy rules, keys, certificates and user information. These servers support client systems, which handle all individual document transactions. Policy changes on the central server automatically initialize or update existing files via a user agent that automatically “crawls” user disks to apply new policies to all applicable documents.
The PSS solution provides a secure audit facility that allows organizations to track events, such as successful access to a document, unauthorized attempts to access a document, or any policy changes on documents. This allows the organization to quickly prove conformance to desired policies and regulations.
Industry Support Leading document technology companies, system integrators, and venture capital firms have indicated their enthusiasm for PSS management, technology, and strategies with more than $30 million in funding. Funding is being provided by Adobe Ventures, Siemens Venture Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Azure Capital Partners, and Granite Ventures.
"Prior to PSS Systems, policies for document security and retention were generally ad hoc and at the author’s discretion," said Fred Mitchell, vice president of venture development at Adobe Systems. "PSS Systems makes it possible to control documents according to a centrally managed policy, which helps ensure regulatory compliance, even when documents are outside a central repository."
"Customers are looking for ways to bring all their mobile, distributed documents into strict compliance with their policies in a way that doesn't rely on individual users,” said Bjoern Eske Christensen, President and CEO, Siemens Venture Capital. “PSS Systems has a highly innovative solution because it's transparent to both users and applications, making it suitable to manage all data assets all the time, without relying on or impacting users, which can bring compliance way down."
The company’s management team includes seasoned professionals with experience from a wide range of noted technology firms. The company will initially focus on providing solutions to industries with high document sensitivity and intense regulatory compliance requirements, such as government, financial services, insurance, life sciences, and system integrators.
Licensing and Availability
The company’s PSS 1 product is currently shipping. A flexible licensing scheme is based on the number of expected users, with initial enterprise installations priced below $40,000. Contact PSS Systems for specific pricing information.
About PSS Systems
PSS Systems, Inc. develops software that empowers enterprises to develop, deploy, manage, and enforce centralized policies for distributed content. Customers include government agencies and companies in the financial services, insurance, life sciences, system integration, and technology industries. The company was founded in 2001 and is backed by leading venture capital firms and corporate investors. For additional information about PSS Systems, call (650) 810-8700, or visit www.pss-systems.com.
PSS and the PSS logo are registered trademarks of PSS Systems, Inc. All other company and product names mentioned are the trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
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