STOCKHOLM, Sweden and WESTBOROUGH, Mass., June 5 /PRNewswire/--Envox Group (www.envox.com), a global provider of open, standards-based communication software, today announced that it had raised $5 million from some of the leading venture capitalists in the Nordic region. Northzone Ventures, IT Provider, and EQVITEC Partners joined first round investors Servisen and Intel Communications Fund in this funding round. At this stage, new Envox board member include Klas Gustafsson (Northzone) and Anders Lindqvist (IT Provider). This investment will be used to accelerate new product development, strengthen the company's marketing and sales efforts, and expand its global technical support capabilities.

"Along with the other new investors, we're very pleased to participate in this round of funding, and we look forward to assisting the Envox management team as they grow their company," said Klas Gustafsson, investment manager for Northzone Ventures. "According to the Kelsey Group, the worldwide Voice Services market has been projected to reach $41 billion by 2005. Of this total, over half is expected to come from areas of potential strength for Envox - as well as their customers and partners - like communication development platforms, voice-enabled solutions and professional services".

The company's technology, products, and services aim to reduce the cost, time-to-market and complexity of developing converged communication solutions like voice portals, enhanced self-service, alerts and notifications and voice- enabled CRM. These solutions blend phones, PCs and the Internet with business applications so that customers can unify and manage multi-channel customer and employee interactions for the highest quality and most consistent experience possible. During April 2002, the company acquired the Show N Tel business from Sonexis, Inc. By combining the Show N Tel intellectual property and customer base with its existing business, Envox is now well positioned to become a leader in the rapidly emerging Voice Services market.

Envox will be building upon its proven ability to deliver outstanding value to its customers based not only on its own "best-of-breed" products, but also those available from its key technology partners such as Nuance, Philips and SpeechWorks, among others. Envox is also a member of the Intel Solution Provider Program that is a part of the Intel e-Business Network.

"This investment round provides us with the resources we need to expand our business over the next twelve to eighteen months," said Henrik Thome, president and CEO of Envox Group. "This funding, combined with the expanded technology, product and service offerings we now have as a result of the Show N Tel acquisition, will enable us to reach a wider range of customers, including channel partners, enterprises and service providers, on a worldwide basis."

About Envox
Envox Group is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden with offices in the US, Canada, Europe and Singapore. The company has built a strong distribution channel of value-added resellers (VARs), service providers, system integrators and ASPs. Today the company has business partners in over 40 countries worldwide. In March 2000, the Intel® Communications Fund invested in Envox. Envox is an Intel/Dialogic Platinum Partner. In April of 2002, the company acquired the Show N Tel business from Sonexis, Inc.

The Envox Communications Development Platform has been used to design a broad range of solutions including interactive voice response, speech recognition, e-commerce, Web automation, wireless, email and unified messaging. It integrates the best technologies, products and industry standards into an object-oriented programming language that provides building blocks developers can quickly incorporate into their applications. Envox solutions are completely scalable from enterprise to ASP to Carrier Grade. The end result is faster time to market, greater application functionality and flexibility, more efficient management of the development cycle and increased profitability.

CONTACT: Envox Media Information (US), contact Gretchen Clarke, (508) 871-7603,

Envox Media Information (Sweden), contact Anneli Danielsson, (46) 8 56 256 015,

About Northzone Ventures (www.northzone.com)