Spotlight Features

With preparations for the 2005 holiday season well underway, many analysts are predicting another banner year for e-commerce. Strong growth has become routine for the online sales industry. But some 10 years after e-commerce began to get noticed and several holiday seasons after nudging its way into...

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office was to publish the world's first "storyline patent" application yesterday. According to Georgetown University law professor Jay Thomas, "The case law of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has established that virtually any subject matter is potentially ...

Last week Microsoft announced its new online extensions to Windows and Office called, coincidently, Windows Live and Office Live. These say a great deal about both Microsoft's direction and the future of desktop software in general. In addition, HP announced an intent to eliminate the concept of the...

The imperative to fight diseases like AIDS and cervical cancer is a no-brainer, yet new technologies that help in this quest are under assault from bureaucrats and advocacy groups. As technology advances, questions surrounding its control and use will only get hotter. A key set of guiding principles...

WiFi hot spots have become quite popular because they enable nomadic travelers to tap into the Internet. The ability to stay connected has reached another area: metropolitan buses. King County Metro Transit, which services the Seattle area, has begun offering WiFi services on a few of its bus lines....

When crises like the recent earthquake in Asia, the London terror bombings and devastating hurricanes such as Katrina strike, more people than ever turn to the Web for news and real-time updates on these history-making events. This is not a new phenomenon, but it continues to be a growing one. Rewi...

In the offshore outsourcing field, client relations managers are often found at both the facility and the facility's North American sales office, if one has been established. As described herein, some firms operate without a North American presence, particularly if they are smaller firms. Most ou...

I'm either fortunate or unfortunate enough to have gone through a couple of significant corporate cycles in the world of business in recent decades. In the 1980s IBM started as the most respected company in the industry and ended as that decade's "Evil Empire." In the '90s, and over what seemed to...

The latest gold rush is on. It's the Chinese broadband market, and just like the award-winning film "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" the market is a labyrinth made up of many plots and lessons, accented with plenty of action. China is emerging as the world's manufacturing center and a sourcing magn...

Are you or your company considering a business acquisition? If so, there is no escaping the need to perform thorough and competent due diligence on your acquisition target. Due diligence can be defined as a complete investigation of an intended acquisition. This investigation of the prospect must in...