FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Brad Davis
800-444-4443 or 727-803-8000
www.FreedomScientific.com
Sales: [email protected]
Freedom Scientific Continues Push for Braille Literacy
PAC Mate and PAC Mate Braille Display Prices Reduced
(St. Petersburg, Florida - October 27, 2011)Freedom Scientific today announced a $500 to $1,005 price reduction on its PAC Mate Omni™ accessible Pocket PCs and portable Braille displays.
The new PAC Mate Omni prices are:
- PAC Mate Omni Speech Only - $995 reduced from $1,495
- PAC Mate Omni with 20 cells of Braille - $2,390 reduced from $2,895
- PAC Mate Omni with 40 cells of Braille - $3,690 reduced from $4,695
The new PAC Mate Braille display prices are:
- PAC Mate 20-cell Portable Display - $1,395 reduced from $1,595
- PAC Mate 40-cell Portable Display - $2,695 reduced from $3,595
These new low price points make the PAC Mate Omni an unprecedented value in accessible mobile computing for the blind. A speech-only PAC Mate is less than half the price charged by competitors, and Freedom Scientific is now offering 40 cells of Braille for about 40% less than what competitors charge for a notetaker with just 32 cells.
The PAC Mate is based on Microsoft's Windows Mobile operating system and is the only notetaker that supports the Microsoft Office suite of applications, Outlook, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. These applications are widely used in schools and at work, and the PAC Mate enables the blind user to share documents and fully collaborate with sighted colleagues.
"A notetaker is a huge productivity tool for a blind person - one that is critical in leveling the playing field for educational and employment opportunities," states Dr. Lee Hamilton, President and CEO of Freedom Scientific. "Unfortunately, notetakers and Braille displays have always been expensive, which has meant that not everyone could get one. Freedom Scientific wants to provide opportunity to as many blind people as possible by making this key assistive technology more widely available."
A PAC Mate with a Braille display makes learning and using Braille easy. The PAC Mate can translate almost any electronic document or Web page into Braille and then display it on a 20- or 40-cell Braille display. The PAC Mate also has a built-in Braille tutor that provides immediate spoken help when the reader encounters an unfamiliar Braille symbol. This makes independent Braille study easier because it can be used with any document of interest to the student. With a PAC Mate and a Braille display, you can carry hundreds of books on a single memory card or USB thumb drive.
"Our Braille cells are constructed without seams between characters, so the user experience is like reading Braille on paper," says Jonathan Mosen, Vice President of Blindness Hardware. "Freedom Scientific first drastically reduced the cost of Braille displays in 2004, when we introduced models 40% below the average price of currently available Braille displays. Since then, efficiencies in design and manufacturing have continued to make it possible for us to reduce prices, and we hope this will make Braille accessible to many more people."
Freedom Scientific's Braille displays are the most reliable in the industry and are backed by technical support and service teams based in St. Petersburg, Florida.
For complete specifications, visit www.FreedomScientific.com or contact Freedom Scientific at 800-444-4443 or 727-803-8000.
About Freedom Scientific
Freedom Scientific is a leading worldwide brand of assistive technology products for those with vision impairments. Freedom Scientific is part of Vispero™. Vispero has its headquarters in the USA and the Netherlands, and offices in Switzerland, Belgium, Canada, Germany and the United Kingdom. Through Vispero's multi-tier distribution, Freedom Scientific products are available in more than 70 countries worldwide.
Freedom Scientific® and its products are registered trademarks in the United States and/or other countries. The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
