Independent Research Firm Assesses and Cites DATATRAK’s EDC V3.2 Product Suite as a Good Choice for Customers
CLEVELAND, Feb. 25 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — DATATRAK International, Inc.(NASDAQ-SMALL:DATA) (Nasdaq: DATA), the leading and most experienced Application Service Provider (“ASP”) in the Electronic Data Capture (“EDC”) industry, today announced that it was among the selected companies that Forrester invited to participate in its February, 2004 EDC TechRankings Report. The full TechRankings report is currently available on the Forrester’s website for it clients.
This technology assessment of EDC providers was initiated in October of 2003 secondary to requests from several pharmaceutical clients of the research firm seeking assistance in objectively evaluating this market. There were a total of eight EDC products and companies selected for this evaluation based upon consistently applied entrance criteria. To assess each EDC provider, Forrester conducted all-day reviews at its Cambridge, MA-based TechRankings Lab which included on-line demonstrations, evaluation of the software suite against approximately 150 functionalities and discussions of product architecture and platforms.
In its TechRanking summary, Forrester highlighted the following attributes of the DATATRAK EDC Version 3.2 Product Suite:
- DATATRAK is a good choice for customers who prefer a very simple user interface - DATATRAK is a good choice for customers who desire subsecond response time in low band-width environments - DATATRAK has an excellent product architecture - DATATRAK has excellent integration capabilities, integrating with a broad range of popular third parties like Oracle Clinical and Phaseforward ClinTrial and incorporating CDISC standards into the product - Customers who plan to deploy globally should consider DATATRAK
DATATRAK will soon have posted on its website the complete Forrester review of its product suite.
“The mere presence of this report is a sign that the EDC market is continuing to develop not only because customers requested that it be performed, but because objectivity and standardized criteria are taking the place of misperceptions and marketing hype,” noted Dr. Jeffrey A. Green, President and Chief Executive Officer of DATATRAK International, Inc. “The true sign of a maturing market is the development of a discipline whereby decisions are made on facts, experience, refereed publications, direct comparisons, logic and references. Objectivity has been missing in this EDC market and this effort goes a long way towards its fulfillment. Many customers have been burned by less substantiated reasons for making an EDC selection and they had to go back to the drawing board and start over. They believed in the advantages of EDC, but realized they initially selected the wrong product for the wrong reasons. DATATRAK has numerous such customers. Lastly, this evaluation puts to rest the misperception that all EDC products and companies are the same.”
About DATATRAK International
DATATRAK International, Inc. is a worldwide ASP for the EDC industry. The Company provides a suite of software products supporting the use of DATATRAK EDCO and related services to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device industries. DATATRAK EDCO was developed in order to deliver clinical research data from investigative sites to clinical trial sponsors faster and more efficiently than conventional, manual methods. DATATRAK EDCO can be deployed worldwide in either a distributed platform using laptop computers or in a centralized environment using the Internet. DATATRAK EDCO software and its earlier versions have successfully supported many international clinical studies involving thousands of clinical research sites and encompassing tens of thousands of patients in over 40 countries. DATATRAK International, Inc‘s product suite has been utilized in some aspect of the clinical development of 14 separate drugs that have received regulatory approval from either the United States Food and Drug Administration or counterpart European bodies. DATATRAK International, Inc. has offices located in Cleveland, Ohio and Bonn, Germany. Its common stock is listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the symbol “DATA.” Visit the DATATRAK International, Inc. web site at www.datatraknet.com or www.datatraknet.de .
Except for the historical information contained in this press release, the statements made in this release are forward-looking statements. Factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward- looking statements include the ability of the Company to absorb corporate overhead and other fixed costs in order to successfully market the DATATRAK EDCO software; the development and fluctuations in the market for EDC technology; continued unreliability of the Internet infrastructure; the degree of the Company’s success in obtaining new contracts; the timing of payments from customers and the timing of clinical trial sponsor decisions to conduct new clinical trials or cancel or delay ongoing trials; dependence on key personnel; governmental regulation; the early stage of the Company’s EDC business and operations; and general economic conditions. In addition, the Company’s success depends on the outcome of various strategic initiatives it has undertaken, all of which are based on assumptions made by the Company concerning trends in the clinical research market and the health care industry.
SOURCE DATATRAK International, Inc.(NASDAQ-SMALL:DATA) -0- 02/25/2004
CONTACT: Jeffrey A. Green, Pharm.D., FCP, President and Chief Executive Officer, Ext. 112, or Terry C. Black, Chief Financial Officer, Ext. 110, both of DATATRAK International, Inc., +1-440-443-0082/ Web site: http://www.datatraknet.com or http://www.datatraknet.de/
