Volume 8, Number 3, January 23, 2003



This Week's Contents:

1) NEWS ABOUT NETPRENEUR
    1.1 Coffee & DoughNet Is Back
2) REGIONAL NETPRENEURS
    2.1 Encore Supports Utility Devices
    2.2 AMN's Wireless Media Software
    2.3 BulkRegister's Online Brand Monitoring
    2.4 Round-up: Quick Hits
......news from WeatherBug, Defywire, and Adrenaline Group
3) FUNDING & FINANCE NEWS
    3.1 Dough Raise Me
......$50K each for 4 local entrepreneurs
    3.2 Life In The Food Chain
......InService America Acquires NuVizion
......ACS Acquires CyberRep
    3.3 Angel Club Formed
    3.4 Ten To Present At DC Early Stage Forum
4) OPPORTUNITIES & RESOURCES
    4.1 Nominations For Young Tech Innovators
    4.2 If You Remember Archie And Veronica, Raise Your Hand
5) WHO'SWARE
......news about people at Draper Atlantic and CIT

|||||||||||||||||||| 1. News About The Program ||||||||||||||||||

1.1 COFFEE & DOUGHNETS IS BACK
Could be the most caffeinated return since Juan Valdez awaited El Exigente. Like other Netpreneur services, it's looking like Coffee & DoughNets will be back in 2003, and this one is truly a region-wide effort. C&D is, of course, Netpreneur's signature monthly event that brings entrepreneurs together to discuss practical entrepreneurial topics. Starting next month, February 25, four of Greater Washington's leading organizations -- the  Maryland Technology Council, the Northern Virginia Technology Council, the Washington, DC Technology Council and Virginia's Center for Innovative Technology (CIT) -- will begin hosting a new series of C&D events -- still focused on entrepreneurial issues, still targeted to early-stage entrepreneurs, and still rotating between venues in Suburban MD, Northern VA, and DC.

Having four such noted organizations from different jurisdictions come together to work on a continuing effort like this one is a testament to the region's commitment to entrepreneurship. Roughly, here's how it will work: Each tech council will host the events in their jurisdiction, alternating each month between the three. CIT will serve as coordinator, with planning, topic development, policy making, etc. to be directed by a steering committee from all the organizations and an advisory board of entrepreneurs. We'll be kicking off with a preliminary series of events in February, March, and April, during which the organizations will get acclimated and determine longer-term management, and logistics issues. Ernst & Young and Fenwick & West are the first sponsors for this preliminary series.

So what's the topic for the first post-Netpreneur C&D? We figured we'd get right to the most pressing issue entrepreneurs have today: generating revenue. As with most things, it's really all about the people, in this case the salespeople. On February 25, we'll examine issues such as hiring your first outside sales person, building a sales organization, the role of sales consultants, sales compensation, setting goals, and much more in a nuts and bolts discussion with a panel of entrepreneurs. Stay tuned for more on how to register.

|||||||||||||||||| 2. Regional Netpreneurs ||||||||||||||||||

2.1 ENCORE SUPPORTS UTILITY DEVICES
(Dulles, VA) Encore Networks, a developer of network security and access products, announced its entry into the utilities industry with its new EtherFRAD solutions, optimized to support the Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition protocol (SCADA). SCADA devices are used by all utility companies, including providers of gas, electric, and water as well as pipelines and railroads, to monitor and gather information such as water pressure, power consumption, and gas usage. The EtherFRAD line enables utility companies to migrate these measurement and control functions to a faster, more reliable digital transmission format, such as Frame Relay, and sets the stage for moving these operations to IP and Virtual Private Networks (VPNs).
http://www.encorenetworks.com
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2.2 AMN'S WIRELESS MEDIA SOFTWARE
(Ashburn, VA) AMN Corporation introduced its new wireless media software product, MediaBroker, which provides media playback, capturing, and sharing for Java-enabled micro devices, such as mobile smartphones, PDAs, AutoPC, and J2ME MIDP technology platforms. The devices can install and run the application from designated Over-The-Air deployment channels such as cellular service carriers and wireless software distributors. A resource adapter module allows for provider plug-ins from commerce-based media content providers, enabling remote browsing and play of accessible media content. It hosts a variety of intelligent, two-way features capable of enterprise media processing and transcoding via wireless carrier back-end.
http://www.a-m-n.com
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2.3 BULKREGISTER'S ONLINE BRAND MONITORING
(Baltimore, MD) BulkRegister, the third-largest accredited domain name registrar in the US, launched BrandCrawler, an online service that monitors millions of websites for potential abuses of a company's product names, brands, and trademarks. Targeted at small to medium-sized businesses, BrandCrawler uses specialized spiders and search algorithms to scour a proprietary database of 40 million sites from all generic top-level domains, such as .com, .org., .net, .biz and .info, and country domains. Along with a site's regular text, links, and logos, it detects unauthorized mentions of company brands or products within a website's hidden text and meta-tags. Reports identify possible abuses, such as cyber squatting (the use of a brand in a domain name), traffic diversion, unauthorized product distribution, counterfeiting and trademark infringement, and includes access to a site's WhoIs details for legal actions.
http://www.brandcrawler.com
http://www.bulkregister.com
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2.4 ROUND-UP: QUICK HITS

(Gaithersburg, MD) WeatherBug released Version 5.0 of its free desktop weather software application. Enhancements include one-click travel forecasts and time-lapsed and live camera images. WeatherBug is the number one source of weather information on the Web, according to comScore Media Metrix.
http://www.weatherbug.com

(Reston, VA) Defywire and Mahwah, NJ-based Sharp Electronics announced a partnership to develop a real-time wireless enterprise email and data access solution by combining Sharp's Zaurus Linux/Java-based PDA with Defywire's enterprise mobile software.
http://www.defywire.com
http://www.sharpusa.com

(Arlington, VA) The Adrenaline Group will develop new computer-based testing materials for NYC-based Triumph Learning, designed to prepare elementary and middle school students to meet state standards for education.
http://www.adrenaline.com
http://www.triumphlearning.com

|||||||||||||||||| 3. Funding & Finance News ||||||||||||||||||

3.1 DOUGH RAISE ME

$50K each for four companies from Maryland's Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO), in collaboration with The Patuxent Partnership (TPP) and the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division (NAWCAD), as part of TEDCO's NAVAIR Technology Commercialization Initiative program. The awards allow technologies from NAWCAD to be developed for marketplace applications. The four companies are UniTech, which is testing energy absorbing coasting systems for reducing the impact of electromagnetic noise on aircraft electronic systems; Calvert Hydraulics, which is building a hydraulics system noise suppression kit for carrier jet blast deflector actuator systems; System Excelerator, which is developing a wireless system for collecting system sensor data; and RL Associates, which is developing a vision system to allow firefighters to see through smoke and flames using an infrared laser-scanning camera.
http://www.marylandtedco.org
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3.2 LIFE IN THE FOOD CHAIN

--InService America Acquires NuVizion
(Washington, DC) NuVizion, a Web development and software solutions firm serving faith-based organizations, announced that Forest, VA-based InService America, a subsidiary of Star Touch International, has merged with its operations and staff. NuVizion now serves as the Web Services Division of InService America, a provider of inbound, outbound, and Internet call center solutions. NuVizion services include development of eCommerce strategies and applications, Internet consulting, custom applications development, and systems integration. Clients include the American Red Cross, American Bible Society, Compassion International, and Sovereign Grace Ministries.
http://www.nuvizion.com
http://www.inserviceamerica.com

--ACS Acquires CyberRep
(McLean, VA) CyberRep, a provider of outsourced customer service support to Fortune 500 companies, was acquired by Dallas, TX-based Affiliated Computer Services (ACS), a provider of business process and information technology outsourcing solutions. CyberRep was founded in 1991 by Douglas Palley and S. Tien Wong, and now has over 2,000 employees and seven locations around the country. CyberReps solution includes payment processing, fulfillment, and customer intelligence.
http://www.cyberrep.com
http://www.acs-inc.com

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3.3 ANGEL CLUB FORMED
(Vienna, VA) John May, Managing Partner of The New Vantage Group, has started a new angel investing club called Active Angel Investors (AAI), a membership network of accredited investors investing in seed-stage opportunities in the Mid-Atlantic region. Members will meet 10 or 11 times over the year to consider two or three investment opportunities per meeting. The network will consider exclusively pre-institutional, early-stage investments, and will typically lead the financing rounds. Unlike May's other investment clubs, such as the Dinner Club, AAI members pay an annual membership fee, then they can decide whether to invest in companies of interest to them on a deal-by-deal basis. May told the Baltimore Business Journal that there are about 15 paid members so far and that he expects 30 to 40 by spring.
http://www.activeangelinvestors.com
http://baltimore.bizjournals.com/baltimore

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3.4 TEN TO PRESENT AT DC CAPITAL FORUM
(Washington, DC) The Washington DC Technology Council announced the 10 companies that will present at its fourth annual Early Stage Capital Forum, which will be held on February 7 at the Ronald Reagan Building & International Trade Center. The companies are Biosurface Engineering Technologies, IMC, Naviance, Defywire, Foxwire, iJet Travel Intelligence, Solvent Solutions, Falcon Systems Engineering, Tech Travelers, and Transactis. Receptor Base was also selected as an alternate. The DC Technology Council sponsors the all-day Capital Forum with participation from the Greater Baltimore Technology Council, Northern Virginia Technology Council, Technology Council of Maryland and Mid-Atlantic Venture Association. This event is open to the region's entrepreneurs, VCs, angel and private investors, technology company executives, and event sponsors.
http://www.dctechcouncil.org

|||||||||||||||||| 4. Opportunities & Resources ||||||||||||||||||

4.1 NOMINATIONS FOR YOUNG TECH INNOVATORS
(Boston, MA) What will the world look like five, 10, 30 years down the road, and who are the young innovators laying the foundation for the technological future? MIT's Technology Review wants to find them and tell their stories. Nominations are now open for the 2003 edition of the TR100, Technology Review's list of 100 young people "whose contributions to emerging technologies will profoundly influence our world." Nominees should not turn 35 before January 1, 2003, and their work should exemplify the spirit of innovation in fields that include Pharmaceuticals, Medicine, Computing, Telecom, Energy, Transportation, Logistics, Manufacturing, and Nanotech. Technology Review will profile all 100 in a special October 2003 issue and recognize them at a dinner and awards celebration in Boston. The deadline for nominations is February 1.
http://www.technologyreview.com/tr100/nomination
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4.2 IF YOU REMEMBER ARCHIE AND VERONICA . . .
(Alexandria, VA) Not the comics, the search tools. BeforeTheWeb is an interactive "oral history" project that is attempting to tell the story of the early days and evolution of the commercial online industry that preceded public access to the Internet and the Web. Conceived and run by local entrepreneur Taylor Walsh with support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, George Mason University's Center for History & New Media, and Bethesda-based Arlen Communications, BeforeTheWeb is collecting documents, artifacts, and stories about pioneer firms such as The Source, formed in McLean in 1978, CompuServe's Microlink service, Quantum (later AOL), MCI Mail, Dow Jones News Retrieval, Delphi, The WELL, GEnie, Prodigy and others, as well as the networks of small, local computer bulletin boards (BBS) around the country. Walsh was a Managing Editor at The Source during the early 1980s, and BeforeTheWeb invites practitioners from the period dating from the late 1970s through the early 1990s to contribute to the history, capturing the recollections, stories, and anecdotes, from the people who worked on the services, technologies, deals, and companies in that era (including efforts that did not succeed). Future histories will examine sectors such as journalism, education, and governing, with sponsors engaged to develop these "wings" of the site.
http://www.beforetheweb.org

|||||||||||||||||| 5. Who'sWare ||||||||||||||||||

(Reston, VA) Draper Atlantic, an early-stage IT venture capital affiliated with Draper Fisher Jurvetson, promoted Thanasis Delistathis to Partner.
http://www.draperatlantic.com

(Herndon, VA) The Board of Directors for Virginia's Center for Innovative Technology (CIT) announced the election of Charles Steger, President of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, as chairman, effective April 1. Paula Gulak, a principal and founding partner of SyCom Technologies, was elected Vice Chairman, and Linda Gentry, CIT's SVP of Finance and Administration, was elected Treasurer and Secretary.
http://www.cit.org

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