news / press room

Looking for tips on building Web alliances?

Susan Butler, lawyer, author and legal columnist for ZDNet's small-business channel, will speak Oct. 4 at the Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce's Small Business Issues Forum.

Butler will discuss issues facing small businesses on the Internet and how to facilitate connections to other small companies worldwide as she travels to more than 25 U.S. and European cities.

Butler also is an example of how a small-business owner can work from a virtual office. With just her laptop and cell phone, she continues practicing law in San Francisco, advising her Internet and entertainment clients, handling their business deals and contracts and writing her legal columns, all while on the road.

Her new book, eBusiness Legal Kit for Dummies, is due out this month from IDG Books Worldwide.

The Small Business Issues Forum begins at 7:30 a.m. in the 27th Floor board room of the GPCC, 201 N. Central Ave., Phoenix. The forum is free to members of the GPCC, North Phoenix Chamber, Greater Phoenix Black Chamber and South Mountain and Laveen Chamber. Cost is $25 for nonmembers.

Avnet ranks high

Avnet Inc. has been honored for its innovative operations by InformationWeek magazine.

The publication about using technology for innovative business practices ranked Avnet as the fourth most innovative company out of 500. The company, with annual revenue equaling $9 billion, ranked first as the most innovative distributor.

The Chandler-based distributor of computers and components has been developing several internal and external e-business strategies, including product-selection tools such as Capacitors Online and Switches Online.

Also, Avnet Connection is designed to make all the company's information accessible on the Web, and ChinaECnet is being developed as an Internet portal for high-tech component transactions with China. The country's Ministry of Information is a principal investor.

For more, visit http://www.avnet.com/ or http://www.informationweek.com/.

Sales help

The Coriolis Group LLC, a Scottsdale-based e-learning company, has partnered with click2learn.com.

Click2learn, formerly known as Asymetrix Learning Systems Inc., has licensed and will resell Coriolis' ExamCram brand of online information technology certification courses and study guides. The partnership gives click2learn e-commerce sales rights and portal access to the Coriolis products.

Courses include lessons, interactive features, practice tests and a forum for question-and-answer sessions among mentors and peers.

Local pact

Ephibian, a local e-business integration firm, was selected by Home bid.com in Scottsdale to provide custom development of its Web site.

Ephibian, headquartered in Tucson with offices in Phoenix, will act as an extension of Homebid's internal software development team to increase the scalability of Homebid's technology. The company's architecture, which supports a site for real-time bidding on residential homes, uses Java Beans technology. The result will be an architecture that is flexible enough to support several business models.

Making a match

If you enjoy playing the matchmaker, or want to be part of a match yourself, there's a new Web application to help people find the ideal mate.

Ed White, chief executive of Phoenix-based Interactive Digital Corp., has created a proprietary system for pairing compatible people. Based on algorithms, his system matches couples on a percent basis. A score of 90 or above is "a match made in heaven" -- using a bit of man-made technology, of course.

Users enter their preferences free on the site, http://www.matchupsingles.com/. When a match of 75 percent or better is found, customers are notified via e-mail and charged a fee if they want contact information for their match.

The MatchUpSingles technology will be offered to Web-based businesses as a service they can sell or retain for themselves.

Members online

Having up-to-date directory information is critical for any organization. Having that information on the Web makes it easier than ever to keep that info current.

But it's still a job someone has to do.

Ann Zumwalt, owner of Webscape Consulting Inc. in Ahwatukee, has made it her specialty.

Zumwalt helps organizations of all types develop an online member directory. She recently won the bid to create one for the national Society of Women Engineers.

The directory Zumwalt created allows members to search a database of 10,000 names by last name, company, city, state, degree, school name, or student vs. professional member status.