FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif., February 13, 2008 – On an ongoing mission to educate enterprises on the benefits of Unified Communications, Applied Voice & Speech Technologies, Inc. (AVST) today announced that it has teamed with InformationWeek to deliver a TechWebCast titled, “Don’t Forklift into Unified Communications.”  The Webinar will take place on Thursday, February 21, 2008 at 12:00 p.m. ET / 9:00 a.m. PT.

At the center of ongoing debate, Unified Communications is one of the most intriguing, yet widely misunderstood technologies under consideration by enterprises today.  With over 25 years of experience in deploying communications solutions to businesses of all sizes and in a wide variety of vertical markets, AVST intends to clear the confusion for enterprise decision-makers searching for the right solution for their business.  The Webinar, featuring industry expert speakers, will define the common elements of Unified Communications (UC) and how the piece-parts can be implemented with the least disruption to the enterprise’s existing IT structure

“We have over 40,000 global installations with integrations to virtually every brand of legacy PBX,” said Denny Michael, AVST’s Vice President of Marketing.   “This kind of experience is unmatched in the industry and provides us with the opportunity to share best practices with those that are considering a move to UC.”

According to Michael, the most common misunderstanding related to adopting UC is the need to “rip and replace” existing infrastructure to achieve the goal.  AVST will share the many good reasons why enterprises should not “forklift to UC” and why enterprises should add UC to their existing environment and not build a totally new infrastructure including:

• Lower initial cost
• Asset retention
• Reduced risk
• Shorter implementations
• Shorter learning curve for the staff, users and implementers

The Webinar will feature industry experts, Gary Audin of Delphi Inc. and Hardy Myers, AVST’s CEO.  Audin has over 40 years of computer, communications and security experience and has planned, designed, specified, implemented and operated data, LAN and telephone networks including local area, national and international networks as well as VoIP and IP convergent networks in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia and Asia.  Myers has traveled the globe evangelizing the benefits and realities of UC.  Since 2003, Myers has led AVST and during that time the company’s solution, CallXpress®, has become the premier enterprise communications platform.

To register for the "Don’t Forklift into Unified Communications" Webinar, please visit: http://www.avst.com/r/cmp.asp for more information.

About AVST
Applied Voice & Speech Technologies, Inc. (AVST) is a leading developer of communications solutions with over 10 million users that rely on its products and services to maximize their productivity. With nearly 30 years of innovation excellence, AVST is focused on delivering solutions that increase user and business productivity. Its flagship Unified Communications platform, CallXpress®, offers unprecedented interoperability and delivers advanced call processing, voicemail, unified messaging, personal assistant, fax, speech and notification capabilities. With CallXpress, an organization can protect and extend its existing data and telephony infrastructure investment — now and into the future.

Headquartered in Orange County, Calif., AVST maintains facilities in Seattle, Wash. and the United Kingdom and has remote sales offices across the United States. AVST's Unified Communications solutions are sold and supported internationally by an extensive network of resellers and OEM partners. For more information contact Denny Michael, Vice President of Marketing, at 949-699-2300 or access the company's website at www.avst.com.