HOT NEWS IN THIS REPORT:

1. Strategy: Thinking ahead, brainstorming the future
2. Strategy: Designing a Web site for maximum usability
3. Middleware helps companies extract value from legacy systems
4. Instant messaging: Not just for consumers any more!
5. Cool tool: A smarter search engine
6. Cool tool: Create a personalized news feed
7. Cool tool: Net-it Central
8. Wireless office networking via "mirror ball"
9. Firm develops broadband wireless solution

Executive Technology Briefing (ETB)
Editor/Publisher: Jordan Ayan
Contributing Editor: Chuck Frey

Please feel free to forward this issue to others who may be interested in learning about these new technology developments!

Questions? Feedback? Suggestions for future topics? Please contact us at: etb@create-it.com

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---STRATEGY: THINKING AHEAD, BRAINSTORMING THE FUTURE---

In today's fast-moving Digital Economy, you can create significant value by focusing your brainstorming efforts on an ideal situation several years out, then brainstorm back to the present to figure out how to get there. As part of these future scenarios, look at some current technology that is limiting what's possible - such as Internet bandwidth - and imagine what strategic opportunities might be created if that constraint was removed. This process will free your thinking to explore areas you might not have considered before.

RealNetworks, the company behind RealAudio, is a great example of how this thinking can be put into practice. When the company developed RealProducer 7.0, a technology that streams VHS quality video at 800Kbps - just over half the rate of a T-1 line over the web. While only a handful of Internet users have access to such high bandwidth, that WILL change in the next year or two. The amount of data that can be transmitted over a fiber optic cable is doubling every 12 months, so it won't be long until bandwidth catches up with the opportunity, and by that time it does, RealNetworks is likely to hold the leading market share.

How can you apply this lesson to your business?

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--STRATEGY: DESIGNING A WEB SITE FOR MAXIMUM USABILITY--

http://www.useit.com

If customers can't find the information they need to make informed purchase decisions on your company's Web site, it could be costing you big money in lost sales. Our rule of thumb is three clicks and you're out - meaning that if it takes a customer more than three clicks to get to the data they need on your Web site, they are not going to continue looking, and are unlikely to return. According to Web site usability expert Dr. Jakob Nielsen, over 90% of all business Web sites have poor usability, because:

- Most sites don't meet real user's needs or allow the kinds of transactions real users want,

- It's hard for visitors to decipher how and where they can navigate within a site, and the potential rewards for doing so, and

- Most Web page content is optimized for print media, which is not the way that users tend to read online.

If even a small percentage of these disgruntled visitors are prospective customers, your site's design could be costing you millions of dollars in missed sales opportunities and good will. Our feeling is that the fastest way to destroy a good brand is with a lousy web site.

This is good news. With so many bad business Web sites it's easy to make your site one of the handful of really valuable ones. How? By developing a laser-sharp focus on meeting real customer and helping them with the hard-to-find answers they can't easily find elsewhere.

Check out Jacob's book, Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity at: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/156205810X/createitincA/ .

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--MIDDLEWARE HELPS COMPANIES EXTRACT VALUE FROM LEGACY SYSTEMS--

http://www.seagullsw.com

While most companies recognize the critical need to Web-enable their business processes, most are not ready to simply throw away their existing (or "legacy") computer systems, in which they have a huge investment. A new breed of "middleware" server software, like J-Walk from Seagull Software, is starting to emerge to help companies bridge the gap between their existing "green screen" legacy business systems and the Web.

One manufacturer we know of needed to provide its 2,000 distributors worldwide with extranet access to parts ordering and warranty claims processes, but realized that dial-in access to its existing AS400 system wouldn't suffice. So it used J-Walk to write a Web-based "front end" to these existing applications, enabling its distributors to check parts availability at the factory on a live basis, place orders and access live warranty claims data, 24 hours a day.

Pricing isn't available, because Seagull usually bundles the server and client software together with consulting and training services. Considering the potential cost savings (over $70,000 a year in this case), J-Walk should quickly pay for itself, even for small to medium sized companies.

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--INSTANT MESSAGING: NOT JUST FOR CONSUMERS ANY MORE!--

http://www.aol.com/aim

AOL's Instant Messenger has long been popular with the chat set that has been able to use it to communicate with each other when logged into AOL. This software is now available to anyone on the Web - not just AOL customers. This tool offers powerful efficiencies to geographically dispersed teams or people who travel a lot. A senior level executive from a satellite messaging firm recently showed us how he uses AOL's Instant Messenger to handle simple "touch and go" discussions with members of his team, no matter where they are.

This executive says that instant messaging tools have helped this company to reduce its long distance phone bills by a modest percentage. Another big plus is that these instant messaging programs are generally free and don't require the company's MIS department to set up.

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--COOL TOOL: A SMARTER SEARCH ENGINE--

http://www.google.com

A new, second-generation Web search engine, Google, uses a unique strategy to help you find the most relevant Web sites on any topic. It does this by analyzing and cataloging the pattern of links BETWEEN Web sites, not the pages and their content. The more links a Web page has to it, the more popular and relevant that's likely to be. It also performs other analyses of the referring site, to determine how many sites link to it. Thus, Google ranks sites based on their implied importance and quality, not on a search query.

Once Google displays the results of your search, you can click on a link called "GoogleScout" within any search listing to view Web sites that are related to it. This makes it a powerful tool that you could use to display a list of a company's competitors.

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--COOL TOOL: CREATE A PERSONALIZED NEWS FEED--

http://www.newspage.com

One of the questions we hear quite often is, "How can I keep up with the latest news and announcements in my industry?" The answer is to create a personalized "news feed" that delivers a tailored stream of industry and competitive news to you.

One popular tools for doing this is NewsPage from Individual, Inc. It allows you to set up a personalized news profile by industry, and also allows you to track some of the most influential companies in technology and industry by company name. Once you've set up your profile, NewsPage will send you a daily e-mail summary of the news items that fit your personalized news filter, plus a Web page URL that you can use to login to your "MyNewsPage" and view the full text of these articles.

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--COOL TOOL: NET-IT CENTRAL--

http://www.net-it.com

Net-it Central 3.5 from Allegis Corporation is an innovative knowledge management tool that we've been keeping our eyes on. It has matured into an organizational power tool that can help your firm to easily create and manage team or companywide knowledge bases.

Net-it Central enables employees to easily upload many common types of documents to an online knowledge base; no conversion to HTML is required. A Java document viewer that enables users to view these documents in their native formats.

Benefits of Net-it Central include allowing more of your team members to publish and share their knowledge quickly and easily, while at the same time providing a high level of administrative control over document approval processes and document management. Pricing varies from $5,000 for a single document site of up to 250 documents, to $18,000 for 50 document sites containing an unlimited number of documents.

The bottom line is that a tool like Net-it Central can act as a catalyst, helping your organization to publish and share critical knowledge and data faster - not only to your employees but also to your market channel partners, including dealers, franchisees and suppliers. And that can translate into a powerful competitive advantage.

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--WIRELESS OFFICE NETWORKING VIA "MIRROR BALL"--

http://explorezone.com/archives/99_10/01_ns_mirror_balls.htm

A Japanese firm is developing a rotating ball-like device covered with mirrors that promises to help spread infrared signals more efficiently around an office to connect computers and peripherals. Dubbed the "chaos mirror," this unusual device uses a combination of curved and flat mirrors to spread infrared signals over a wide area from a single point.

The developers, Advanced Telecommunications Research Laboratories say this solution is more efficient than bouncing infrared signals off of ceilings or other flat surfaces, which tends to weaken the signal.

On the downside, all of the devices on the network must be in the same room, since infrared signals can't pass through walls. The firm hopes to commercialize this wireless networking technology in the next year or two.

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--FIRM DEVELOPS BROADBAND WIRELESS SOLUTION--

http://www.winstar.com

As the broadband data revolution gathers steam, most players are finding that it takes huge investments of time and manpower to upgrade copper wires, coaxial cables and fiber optic lines that are the circulation system of the Digital Economy. An innovative firm called Winstar has developed a way to sidestep most of this physical infrastructure by providing broadband data speeds of up to 250 Mbps (about 2,500 times the speed of a 56K modem) over the ultra high-frequency 38 GHz radio frequency.

Rather than providing ubiquitous wireless Internet access, however, Winstar is focusing on providing point-to-point connections between nearby buildings. When a user sends data over this network, it gets transmitted from a Winstar antenna in a tight beam to another antenna on a nearby building, which is connected to a hub that transfers it to a high-speed fiber optic network leased from a long-distance company. Winstar doesn't price this broadband service separately, because it gets bundled into customized wide-area networking solutions for large corporate clients.

Winstar's technology is already being implemented faster than many competing wired technologies, such as DSL and cable modems. We predict that this technology will carve out a significant niche for itself in the broadband data market, because it provides such an elegant high-speed data solution for fixed, point-to-point business applications.

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That's all for now! I welcome your comments and feedback on the Executive Technology Briefing, which will help me to focus it even more closely on your needs.

Jordan Ayan
President
Create-it!