SOURCE: Universal Mind

November 18, 2008 08:00 ET

Universal Mind Wins Intuit WorkPlace Application Contest

Small Business Application Features GIS Technology, Allows Companies to See Dynamic Customer Trends

GOLDEN, CO--(Marketwire - November 18, 2008) - Universal Mind, Inc., a leading solutions provider for Rich Internet Applications (RIA), today announced it has won Intuit Inc.'s WorkPlace Application Contest for its small business application designed for the Intuit Partner Platform. The application, Customer Explorer from SpatialKey, was built with dynamic rich Internet features and is powered by SpatialKey, Universal Mind's Web-based framework for viewing, working with and reporting on information based on a map location and time.

Customer Explorer from SpatialKey allows customers to quickly see geographic and temporal trends in user's QuickBooks customer data. Users can view interactive heat maps of their balances and filter by time, job status or job type and drill down to specific customer and job details. Street and satellite imagery in the application is provided by MapQuest®. Users can also view thematic demographic data provided by *Placebase's Pushpin® data and mapping service, which includes median household income, in context with their own customer data.

An independent panel of judges consisting of prominent reporters and bloggers selected Universal Mind as the contest winner because it was able to meet all four contest requirements -- solve a small business problem, use Adobe FLEX technology, provide a network effect for the application, and deliver an application that is easy to use and provides a delightful user experience. The rewards for winning the contest include a $5,000 cash prize and the chance to demo Customer Explorer by SpatialKey at Intuit's booth (#313) at The Adobe MAX conference in San Francisco being held Nov. 17-19.

The Intuit Partner Platform enables developers to rapidly design, deploy and market rich Internet applications that work with QuickBooks® and utilize Intuit's proven on-demand infrastructure.

"We were excited to participate in this contest to create a new application that will help small companies better understand their businesses," said Brett Cortese, president, Universal Mind. "Intuit's user community, which includes more than four million small businesses, will see a lot of value in what Customer Explorer from SpatialKey can do for them because of its ability to drill down to specific business data and display that data through various filters and geospatial maps."

"Universal Mind is one of the top Flex development companies in the world," said Alex Chriss, business leader for the Intuit Partner Platform. "Their craftsmanship with Flex technology was evident in the Customer Explorer product they designed, which delivers a richly detailed and a highly usable small business solution. This is a perfect example of the Intuit Partner Platform enabling a talented developer to deliver powerful and unique business applications for the small business community. We look forward to working with them on other business applications in the future."

A preview release of Customer Explorer from SpatialKey is now available for free on the Intuit Workplace at http://workplace.intuit.com. As Universal Mind gathers user feedback on the application, it will be enhanced with expanded features that will be offered on a paid basis. *Pushpin is a registered trademark of Placebase.

About Intuit Inc.

Intuit Inc. is a leading provider of business and financial management solutions for small and mid-sized businesses; financial institutions, including banks and credit unions; consumers and accounting professionals. Its flagship products and services, including QuickBooks®, Quicken® and TurboTax® software, simplify small business management and payroll processing, personal finance, and tax preparation and filing. ProSeries® and Lacerte® are Intuit's leading tax preparation software suites for professional accountants. The company's financial institutions division, anchored by Digital Insight, provides on-demand banking services to help banks and credit unions serve businesses and consumers with innovative solutions.

Founded in 1983, Intuit had annual revenue of $3.1 billion in its fiscal year 2008. The company has approximately 8,000 employees with major offices in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and other locations. More information can be found at www.intuit.com.

About Universal Mind

Universal Mind is an enterprise Rich Internet Application (RIA) development firm that provides optimized web solutions to create engaging user interfaces, enhance information delivery and solve critical business problems. The Universal Mind team, together the largest collection of RIA experts in the world with experience in Flex, AIR and SilverLight, has completed hundreds of successful implementations for highly satisfied enterprise customers across vertical industries and geographies. Featured on Inc. Magazine's 500 Fastest Growing Companies in 2008 and 2007, Universal Mind was founded in 2003 and has offices in Golden, Colorado and Westfield, Massachusetts with resources and customers around the world. For more information please visit: http://www.universalmind.com.