Sonic Foundry Honors Winners of Rich Media Impact Awards for Webcasting Innovation around the World

MADISON, Wis., May 9, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Sonic Foundry, Inc. (NASDAQ: SOFO), the trusted market leader for lecture capture, enterprise and event webcasting, today announced the winners of the eighth annual Rich Media Impact Awards, which honor excellence in the practical and creative integration of Mediasite in business, education, health and government.

Winners were honored at UNLEASH 2012 in Madison, Wis., and the awards ceremony can be viewed on-demand at http://sofo.com/bc845.

"We continue to be amazed at all of the innovative uses of rich media in education, government and enterprise settings. The finalists have transformed the way their organizations and universities communicate, train employees and teach through Mediasite webcasting," said Rob Lipps, executive vice president of Sonic Foundry. "Congratulations to this year's winners who join more than 140 organizations across the globe that have received a Rich Media Impact Award."

2012 Rich Media Impact Award Winners

Association Award: Tennessee Bar Association

"This mentoring program provides free video programming for lawyers seeking advice in three areas: opening a law office, expanding practice areas and enhancing professional development. Videos are recorded through Mediasite by lawyers who are experts in their field. Mediasite provides an innovative platform for delivering these services."

~ Stan Graham, a Nashville lawyer and TBA member

Enterprise Award: Memphis City Schools-Office of Instructional Technology

"We were able to have our business operations department get on board to start using Mediasite for tools such as OSHA videos, bloodborne pathogen training and CPR. That's been quite a successful program for us, and has saved us a ton of money since we previously were outsourcing this."

~ Jeff Baxter, special projects coordinator

Excellence in Education: University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Financial Security

"Mediasite facilitates the dissemination of applied research to a national audience and has enabled the Center for Financial Security at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to reach practitioners who are working to improve the financial lives of Americans."

~Nicole Truog, Associate Director  

Global Reach Award: Hospice Education Network

"Since 2007, the Hospice Education network has provided online education and training to hospices across the country. We're in the process of outreach to other settings and in fact even other continents. We currently are working with Swaziland Hospice at Home and Island Hospice and Bereavement Service in Zimbabwe."

~ Heather Wilson, chief executive officer

Healthcare Award: SingHealth Academy, Singapore Health Services

"Since we have implemented the Mediasite system, our residents can now attend the real-time lecture without traveling. Another advantage for the residents is when they miss the lectures, they can now access their Mediasite portal to watch the lectures offline anytime, anywhere."

~ Edison Ng, manager of Learning Technologies, SingHealth Academy

Prolific Use Award: Alphaport, Inc. for the NASA Safety Center

"One highly acclaimed product of the NASA Safety Center is the technical excellence safety and mission assurance education and training program. STEP, as it's known in the agency, is a four level curriculum designed to provide technical safety courses to about 1,000 civil servants and 1,000 government contractors agency-wide. Currently the STEP program boasts 150 active courses, 45 of which have been video captured totaling about 530 hours of instruction. The use of Mediasite has made a big impact on the availability of coursework for NASA learners since only a fraction of those learners could have been taught in the classroom."

~ James May, Program Manager at Alphaport, Inc.

Rapid ROI Award: San Antonio College

"Mediasite redefined our customer service training by yielding highly effective call agents. Mention Mediasite in any meeting and people know the end product is that of high quality."

~Mona Aldana-Ramirez, director of retention support services

Scholastic Achievement Award: Anchorage School District

"When Mediasite equipment arrived in the Anchorage School District I hit the ground running. There was great demand for video training, and trainers have been knocking at the door ever since. By the second year we surpassed the 1,000 video mark. We were running as quickly as possible just to keep up with the demand for recording. Mediasite gives us an edge by being able to provide what our staff needs when they need it."

~ Cheryl Johnson, technology production coordinator

Student Impact Award: Maya Tutughamiarso, Goethe-University Frankfurt

"I was amazed by the idea of creating an interactive online, offline learning session with this system. There was no additional work for me to do. I just had to stand in the lecture hall as normal and hold my lecture as if it was for a local class."

~ Maya Tutughamiarso, PhD student at Goethe-University

All Rich Media Impact Award nominations are available as an on-demand video library at www.sonicfoundry.com/finalists2012.  

About Sonic Foundry®, Inc.

Sonic Foundry (NASDAQ: SOFO, www.sonicfoundry.com) is the trusted market leader for enterprise webcasting and lecture capture, providing video communication solutions for education, business and government. Powered by the patented Mediasite webcasting platform and Mediasite Events group, the company empowers people to transform the way they communicate online, using video webcasts to bridge time and distance, accelerate research and improve performance. Product and service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of Sonic Foundry, Inc. or their respective owners.

Certain statements contained in this news release regarding matters that are not historical facts may be forward-looking statements. Because such forward-looking statements include risks and uncertainties, actual results may differ materially from those expressed in or implied by such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include, but are not limited to, uncertainties pertaining to continued market acceptance for Sonic Foundry's products, its ability to succeed in capturing significant revenues from media services and/or systems, the effect of new competitors in its market, integration of acquired business and other risk factors identified from time to time in its filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

SOURCE Sonic Foundry, Inc.