Foreca

Foreca has won the Flash Application category of the Forum Nokia S60 3rd Edition Challenge for global developers. Running on the Symbian OS platform in the Nokia S60 handset, the FlashWeather product provides a wide array of weather services, including current local weather and forecasts and satellite images and weather maps in selected locations and surroundings. The FlashWeather application has been done on with flash technology, making it user-friendly and superior in graphic design. Winning the award means a 25 000 EUR top prize and a one-year free membership in Forum Nokia PRO.

The Nokia S60 3rd Edition Challenge was competed in four categories: Best Enterprise, Flash and Mobile Music Applications and Best Location-Aware Service/Application. A total of 117 applications/products entered the competition. Foreca won the Flash Lite application category with its FlashWeather product, which enables the reception of local four-day forecasts, the latest weather conditions, satellite images, precipitation forecasts and weather and temperature maps in selected locations and surroundings.

The jury of the competition emphasized several key features in the FlashWeather Application: "The application brings all relevant weather information to mobile phone users in a rich, engaging format within one compact application. It also leverages the movie-nature of the Flash Lite runtime extremely well. To further optimize the intuitive navigation, the user interface uses animated features for weather conditions and satellite maps, making it very engaging to view the delivered information. Finally, the application also showcases the benefits of convergence between desktop and mobile applications, by bringing a familiar user experience from the desktop to mobile users wishing to use the service on their handset."

"We are extremely proud of our FlashWeather product and happy to receive this award," says Marko Moilanen, Foreca's Director of Business Development. "It is proof of our knowledge of mobile applications and it is an excellent reference for the entire company."

The New Product Will Soon Be on the Markets

Three localised versions of WeatherFlash will be launched soon in Europe, Asia and the United States. "In the future, we will also provide country specific versions. Currently we are able to support 25 different language versions and new ones will be added on according to market demand," says Foreca's Product Designer Kristian Lehtomaa.

"We've developed Flash weather applications for the Internet for over five years and now we've adapted the familiar format to mobile handsets that support the Flash Lite technology. Consumers will be able to get the FlashWeather product in their devices next month through various distribution channels. We are also actively looking for new partners for international distribution." Moilanen emphasizes.

For more information:
Marko Moilanen, Director, Business Development
e-mail: marko.moilanen@foreca.com
mobile + 358 50 541 1124