Cambridge, UK; December 2, 2002 — Marathon Oil Company, an international energy business headquartered in Houston, Texas, has adopted Jaws PDF Server from Global Graphics Software, a centralized server-based solution for Portable Document Format (PDF) file creation and distribution. The software has simplified digital document exchange by providing staff with an easy and affordable way of creating standardized PDF files that can be sent from any of its 10,000 networked PCs located at sites from Alaska to South Africa, and viewed by the free Adobe Acrobat Reader. Marathon Oil Company holds a 62% interest in Marathon Ashland Petroleum LLC (MAP) in Findlay, Ohio, which is one of the largest petroleum refiners in the United States. MAP and Marathon Oil's IT group is responsible for serving computer users in both companies and initially installed the Jaws PDF Server software in a central area on one of its NT 4 servers, running dual 900 MHz processors, as a trial for staff of both companies to create PDF files from a diverse range of document creation applications. Trials have been so successful that Jaws PDF Server has been installed on one of the company’s mainstream servers and is in full production to make PDF creation available, easily, simply and economically, to any employee on Marathon’s global network. Michael Young, Advance Senior IT Integrator, comments: "PDF use has grown within the company because of increased electronic communications internally and externally. Rather than printing out a document created on a computer and mailing a hardcopy, everybody now uses e-mail and trades electronic files. "However, sending files electronically as a form of communication has it drawbacks. We work with many different software packages. If we want to send a file created in QuarkXPress or various GIS or CAD packages, the person receiving the file has to have the same software, and often the same version. By converting the documents to PDF, users in any department can exchange or print documents from form letters to full-scale engineering drawings knowing that the others can view and print them." Using Jaws PDF Server to create PDF files is as easy as printing a document. The user can merely drag and drop PostScript, TIFF or EPS files into a hot folder on the desktop, or can print to PDF from within any application. Files earmarked for PDF creation are picked up by Jaws PDF Server SmartInput function and routed automatically to their proper destination after PDF generation. "One advantage of using Jaws PDF Server is that we only had to establish printer settings once and everyone on the network is able to use it. And there are more settings and even a post-processing capability to route the PDF files created, if we need more flexibility," says Young. Testing went smoothly, with about 80 employees in departments from engineering to accounting, IT and legal and human resources using it with ease. "We use Jaws PDF Server to create a variety of documents – including PDFs of 36 x 48 inch engineering drawings and PowerPoint presentations that outside contractors could easily view and print at full size on a large-frame plotter, or shrink to fit on an office printer."