Charlotte, NC (September 23, 2021) -

LEAD Technologies, Inc. is pleased to announce the release of LEADTOOLS Version 22. Headlining this major version release is the introduction of LEADTOOLS Edit SDK, a powerful JavaScript-based document editor, new multi-platform ICR and ID Recognition components, and countless major enhancements throughout the LEADTOOLS Document, Medical, Imaging and Multimedia product lines. LEADTOOLS Version 22 continues LEAD’s tradition of providing highly optimized and valuable development tools to programmers developing solutions to solve the complex challenges of this era of digital transformation.

"For more than three decades, LEAD has brought world-class Recognition, Document, Medical, Multimedia and Imaging technologies to the global market with computer vision and AI backing everything we do", said Moe Daher, Chairman and CEO of LEAD Technologies. “We are excited to bring another powerful version of LEADTOOLS to the developer world with the addition of our Document Editor in the LEADTOOLS Edit SDK and comprehensive ID Reader in our Recognition SDK along with so many great enhancements and features throughout our product line."

New Document Edit SDK

LEAD continues to provide innovative technology to help developers build better applications. The new LEADTOOLS Document Editor is a zero- footprint document-editing solution for HTML5/JavaScript apps. The Editor supports directly loading and editing formats, such as DOC, DOCX, PDF, RTF, and TXT, and saving formats, such as PDF, DOCX, and TXT, and does not require licensing third-party components.

With rich document-editing capabilities, including undo/redo, clipboard (cut/copy/paste), ruler, fonts and styles, paragraph styles, alignment, lists (bulleted and numbered), images (all modes: inline, break text, wrap text), tables (including split, merge, styles, borders, tables within tables), hyperlinks, headers/footers, page break, and keyboard shortcuts, the Editor is ideal for Enterprise Content solutions.

New Intelligent ID Reader SDK

Leveraging the technology in LEAD’s AI-Powered Document Analyzer SDK, the new LEADTOOLS ID Reader intelligently extracts data from live streams and photos of ID cards and driver’s licenses without requiring a predefined layout. The state-of-the-art recognition algorithms within the ID Reader recognize IDs from any country, state, or agency.

Significant OCR and ICR (Handwritten text) Enhancements

In version 22, LEAD’s engineers have added new noise and line removal techniques that improve the recognition of machine-printed and handwritten characters. This greatly improves the OCR of document images. Additionally, they have expanded the platform support for the LEADTOOLS ICR SDK to include .NET Core, Java, Objective-C, and Swift for Windows, Linux, macOS, iOS, and Android app development.

Expanded PDF SDK and Office Format Support

The PDF team has improved PDF font embedding, which greatly enhances PDF/A conversion results. PDF Digital Signature support was also expanded to Java and .NET Core.

In version 22, LEAD added support to load password protected Office formats for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Additionally, support to load Excel files now includes the XLSB format. For PowerPoint, options to show or hide slides as well as other major updates to rendering have been added. For Outlook, the rendering of the PST, EML, and MSG formats has been greatly enhanced.

Medical Toolkit Additions and Enhancements

In an effort to increase image accuracy as well as cut down on the need for additional radiation for patients, LEAD has significantly expanded 3D capabilities in Version 22. This includes a new virtual cephalometric rendering method to create a sagittal X-ray projection of a 3D volume, a new MPR implementation providing faster and clearer rendering and more accurate cutlines, and a new patient adjustment (rotation) tool to compensate for improper patient positioning and alignment for imaging. Additionally, a single/double cutline feature was added to the Medical Web Viewer, so users can cut two perpendicular lines on a 3D volume and extract the cutline slices.

Version 22 also brings enhancements to the DICOM Storage Server including added support to run multiple instances, new temporary file options, new log filter options, increased speed for TLS secured connections, and added options to specify the number of forward attempts to additional PACS servers.

Multimedia and Imaging Updates

Within the Multimedia SDK, LEAD has added support to play Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP) content that carry embedded MPEG-2 transport streams, allowing developers to create powerful applications to send and receive audio and video over UDP and HTTP internet/intranet connections. Additionally, the LEADTOOLS DirectShow players and converters can automatically correct video captures from rotated mobile devices.

In version 22, LEAD added new support to load and save HEIC/HEIF (High Efficiency Image Format) images. Additionally, support for CGM ClearText encoding has been added.

There are many other features, updates, and enhancements packed into this major version release. For more details on all of LEADTOOLS Version 22 and to download a free, fully-functional evaluation SDK, please visit here.

About LEAD Technologies

With a rich history of more than 34 years, LEAD has established itself as the world's leading provider of software development toolkits. LEAD's flagship product, LEADTOOLS, provides programmers with a powerful set of libraries for Recognition, Document, Vector, Medical, Imaging, and Multimedia development. LEAD boasts a diverse customer base as well as a strong list of corporate partners including some of the largest and most influential organizations from around the globe. For more information, visit www.leadtools.com.