The following profile was compiled from an interview with John Terzich, Director of Sales at Lanworth. Read on to learn how they are using technology to generate revenue.
Get some valuable advice and the recipe to this business’ Secret Sauce!
The Business
Lanworth’s Real-time Acres and Yield product uses daily satellite imagery to develop timely, accurate
estimates of agricultural production in key international markets. Satellite imagery, analyzed in the context of local soil, weather, management, and plant genetic conditions, provides spatially detailed crop area and yield estimates at national scales.
The Tools
Lanworth uses satellite data from both public and private satellites to deliver daily crop information globally. This solution acts as a revenue generation tool for our clients as well as a risk mitigation tool. Our model delivers revenue in two ways- Subscription revenue to our portal and bi weekly reports, along with proprietary projects.
The Users
The users of our technology are Hedge Funds, Commercial Food Companies, Commodity Trading Firms and Agricultural Producers. Our clients use our information to trade and hedge commodities as well as perform long range supply chain analysis.
The Challenge
Digesting the vast amounts of data daily required re-architecting of our infrastructure and implementing open source Linux servers, which are reducing our costs on computing. Lanworth’s data storage and processing is growing at approx a terabyte a month, Bringing in that much data from satellites and then analyzing on a daily basis requires highly scalable and powerful systems.
The Future
We are seeing exponential growth within our premier subscriptions and special projects, we are looking to create a seamless data portal for crops on a global scale with real time crop information updated daily. We currently offer the portal for US markets. Years ago this program would not be feasible due to the cost of data acquisition and storage, as costs continue to come down per gigabyte we see enhanced information with more frequent updates and increased resolution as key product improvements.
The Advice
Invest in proper architecture with long term goals in mind…build the right foundation and growth is much easier.
We are receiving extremely positive feedback about iRa from the development community. The 350+ developers that saw the demo at the iPhoneDevCamp 2 in San Francisco last weekend were so impressed by the application that iRa won the “Coolest iPhone App” award at the end of the 2 day event.
Watch the demo below and then check out the Lextech Labs News page to see what people are saying about iRa!
Founder & CEO of Lextech Labs and Lextech Global Services, Alex Bratton, was a guest on Inside Mac Radio. During the radio segment, Alex is interviewed by Scott Shephard (Host/Anchor of Inside Mac Radio) about Lextech Labs and the mobile surveillance product, iRa. The show can be downloaded on iTunes and accessed through http://www.insidemacradio.com as a podcast. Check it out!
It is a typical weeknight in your local shopping mall. People from every walk of life are patronizing a variety of stores in the facility. Mothers and their children are scoping out the latest bathing suit sales. Students are browsing the aisles of the book store for their reports, no doubt due tomorrow. Sports enthusiasts are examining the hottest new cross trainers at the the athletic shoe store. Everyone is caught up in the pace of their personal shopping experience, just as they should be.
Suddenly in the distance, you see a man wearing a ski mask dart out of the corner Jewelry store. And then you hear a scream. And then another. People pour out of the jeweler’s frantically, with little regard for who they run over on their way out. Panic alarms echo throughout the crowded hallway.
Is this really happening? Are my teenage children safe in the food court? Has anyone been injured? Should I make a run for my car or should I wait inside for the authorities to secure the parking lot? All these questions and more are racing through the minds of mall patrons.
Store security sends a page to all guards to be on the look out for the suspect, yet none of them are able to explain the suspect’s appearance via radio in a timely manner. A security guard in the back room full of surveillance monitors zooms in on the suspect and realizes he is only a few yards away from him, near the Pottery Barn. He sends this message via radio, but is unable to chase the suspect himself, for fear of losing track of the perpetrator on the monitors. The suspect escapes. Terror echoes throughout the now empty hallways of the shopping center, and you (the facility manager) have a lot of explaining to do to the local authorities.
The sad truth is that the story didn’t have to end this way. You could have had an extra security guard walking the floor. Your surveillance monitor could have chased after the suspect, while still keeping an eye on his whereabouts. Or better still the situation could have been avoided altogether if all of your guards were able to monitor and control the surveillance cameras simultaneously for suspicious activity.
iRa is a simple solution to this type of security challenge. iRa is Lextech Labs’ remote surveillance viewing and control system that puts the power of multiple live video feeds and direct camera pan-tilt-zoom control in the palm of your security guards’ hands on an iPod Touch or an iPhone. The guards in the unfortunate scenario above would have had access to real time video to rewind and zoom in on the appropriate camera to get a fast, accurate ID. The guard in the surveillance room would be able to watch the video on his iPhone, while intercepting the suspect at one of the exits.
Do you have one or more large facilities that need to be closely monitored by security professionals? Do you employ a person to sit in a back room and watch a bunch of surveillance cameras? Do you want to increase security presence in the main areas of your facility, without neglecting your surveillance videos or adding extra personnel?
We are proud to announce the opening our new sister company, Lextech Labs. Sure, a sister company may not be a sibling in the traditional sense, but there are some commonalities.
We have the same parents. Or in this case, parent. Alex Bratton founded Lextech Global Services in July of 2001. Over the past 7 years, he has worked to establish Lextech Global Services as a leading provider of systems engineering and support services. Working closely with clients and listening to their business challenges brought to light a demand for increased mobility in the security and surveillance industry. Alex decided to start Lextech Labs in July of 2008 as a response to this demand.
Lextech Labs will be a product-based organization, and the first family of products will be a high-end set of surveillance applications that operate over WiFi via the intuitive touch interface of an iPod Touch or iPhone.
We rely on each other. Lextech Global Services will design and engineer cutting-edge iPhone applications as solutions to real business needs. Lextech Labs will then bring these products to market for personal and commercial use.
Lextech Labs trusts that we will provide the highest level of systems engineering expertise and software development because we have a proven record of success. The Lextech Global Services team has extensive experience working with high-end surveillance systems, embedded software, and military security projects for industry leaders like QuickSet International and the United States Army, Navy, and Coast Guard.
We share. We have taken the life lesson “share your toys” we learned as children to heart. Sure, our toys consist of high-end technologies, but they still elicit the same type of excitement. Both companies will play an active role in research and development and share resources to make it easy for users to interact with their complex systems using Lextech Labs’ products.
We also share the same facility at 3080 Ogden Avenue, Suite 200 in Lisle, IL.
Learn more about Lextech Labs and their exciting new product line by visiting http://lextechlabs.com today!
If the phrases “fault tolerance” and “load balancer” sound all but foreign to you, you are not alone. I used to consider myself fairly well versed in technical jargon. It wasn’t until I started working in the Marketing Department at Lextech that I realized how much I didn’t know. There were times I felt like I was working in a distant land, where everyone dealt in a currency to which I didn’t have access.
With the knowledgeable Lextech team as my guide, I have picked up more technology tidbits in the last year than I imagined possible. Hopefully, these terms will help you navigate the technology jungle with a little more confidence.
fault tolerance: A system is built so that if a part fails the system functions properly until the broken part can be replaced. The value of designing a system with fault tolerance is that it will reduce the occurrences of unexpected down time.
load balancer: This is a device used to distribute a heavy work load across multiple computers. This technique enables you to efficiently serve more users and ensures that no one computer is overwhelmed or relied upon too heavily.
Software as a Service (SaaS): This is web-based software that provides some type of ongoing value. Customers pay by use, rather than buy it outright. An example of this would be an email marketing program, like Bronto.
web 2.0: This is a way to categorize a website. The powers that be tend to refer to it as the “next generation” of websites. There are no hard and fast rules that qualify a site as Web 2.0. That said, Web 2.0 sites can be identified by their increased emphasis on collaboration, design, functionality, and usability. One sure-fire sign you are looking at a Web 2.0 site is a high level of interactivity. Facebook is a good example.
Look for more terms in Part 2, coming soon! If you have a tech term you would like to know more about, leave a comment and I will try to address it in a future post.
The following profile was compiled from an interview with Lisa Reisman, Co-Founder and Managing Director of Aptium Global, Inc. Read on to learn how she is using technology to generate revenue.
Get some valuable advice and the recipe to this business’ Secret Sauce!
The Business
We work with manufacturing companies on their most complex metals related purchases. We are becoming more of a metals advisory firm where we provide expert guidance, project support and global sourcing services. We will soon be adding a global metals pricing index on a subscription basis.
The Tools
We have a blog site which serves as a means for reaching out to our client base. We have obtained new clients from the site. We are also using the blog as a platform to launch web-based subscription services. It provides us with the opportunity to better highlight our expertise and opinions and to scale the business beyond the number of people we could physically talk to in a day. It also helps us track what issues/topics are relevant to our clients and other interested parties.
The Users
Our end users include metals buyers, investors, ETF, commodity traders, sourcing professionals etc.
The Challenge
The biggest one is developing an application at an affordable cost point that allows us to experiment while still earning revenue. We were able to do this by creating the first version of our service at an affordable price point with follow-on stages funded out of earnings.
The Future
We want to be the go-to resource for all industrial metals purchasing within the US and Western Europe. It’s essential that technology form the basis for our services. To create a scalable business, we need the flexibility of our blog platform and a means of creating the foundational application from which to build various subscription based businesses including a pricing tool with forecasting capability.
The Advice
I would suggest that they (business owners that are apprehensive about technology investments) speak to as many vendors/providers as they can and identify a firm that can form the basis of a long term partnership….a firm that is willing to “invest” and work collaboratively and creatively with you.
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About Lisa Reisman
Lisa Reisman is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Aptium Global Inc. and has over 15 years of experience in management consulting and direct materials sourcing. In addition to past roles at Andersen and Deloitte Consulting, Lisa has also owned and operated her own metals trading company, sourcing and selling a full range of metal products from and to emerging markets including: Russia, China, India, Romania, Venezuela, Mexico, Taiwan, South Africa, Ghana, Pakistan and Israel.
Lisa earned her MPA from New York University, where she received a Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Administration Fellowship. She also holds a BA in political science and journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. As an expert in global trade and supply chain issues, Lisa is INCOTERM certified and holds a Six Sigma Black Belt. Her opinions have been quoted in numerous industry trade magazines such as Business Credit Magazine, Darwin Magazine, The Industry Standard, GlobalAutoIndustry and Automotive Industry Action Guide among others. She has recently authored a column on Lean Sourcing in tight commodity markets for Modern Plastics Worldwide. She currently serves as Editor-at-Large of Surplus Record, an industrial publication with a circulation of 75,000. Lisa is a regular columnist for the blog:Spend Matters.
View Lisa’s complete bio here. Don’t forget to stop by Aptium Global’s blog, MetalMiner, today!
The following profile was compiled from an interview with Ara Surenian, founder and President of Cadent Resources, Inc. Read on to learn how he is using technology to generate revenue.
Get some valuable advice and the recipe to this business’ Secret Sauce!
The Business
Cadent Resources, Inc. drives speed and profit at manufacturing and distribution companies by optimizing supply and demand. Our LeanFacility Supply Management Solution eliminates operating waste to increase the speed production and fulfillment. Our DemandCaster Demand Management Solution assures the right amount of inventory and capacity is available at the right time.
The Tools
We have added a new service called DemandCaster. It is an outsourced demand management service built as a SwaS* (Software with a Service) application with a dedicated virtual demand analyst assigned to the client to perform analysis and drive improvement. My hope is that this will become our primary revenue stream and will supplant the traditional consulting services we provide.
The Users
The users are typically operations type personnel such as materials, production, and operations managers and their reports.
The Challenge
The biggest challenge is the extraction of the data from the clients ERP system. It is this data that the system uses to do its analysis. We have not found a magic bullet but have learned that the best way to get data is to use the IT person or company the client company already works with. Typically these individuals are trusted and provide the client custom reports and other system related services and can extract the data we need quickly and reliably. They can also help us automate the extraction to assure we are able to get data when needed. They may also become a partner in identifying new prospects that can benefit from the service we provide.
The Future
The future business will be a technology driven company and the services we provide must be reliable and must achieve results simply yet robustly. The trick will be to find the balance between being technology driven and efficient and not losing the human touch and intelligence. This is critical in order to prevent our service from being commoditized which is an issue in wholly technology driven solutions.
The Advice
Talk to and work with people that know technology and can provide advice and services that will help you move forward at a cost you can afford. You can do quite a bit with not a lot of dollars so don’t be afraid to take the plunge for fear of making mistakes. The fact is mistakes will be made but the beauty of technology is that the cost to fix errors is not prohibitive and often mistakes will yield a better result. Also, don’t be afraid to start testing before the solution is perfect. It will never be perfect. Just be careful that an initial launch be performed in a controlled environment so if there are problems only the control group is affected.
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About Ara Surenian
Ara Surenian, the founder and President of Cadent Resources Inc., has more than 20 years of experience in management, operations, and engineering. His specialty is designing and implementing business processes that blend lean manufacturing, supply chain management, and business intelligence to significantly improve a company’s cash flow and profit.
Ara is an advisor to business owners and is a seasoned and storied presenter at professional associations, executive roundtables, and seminars. He is a member of APICS, The Association for Operations Management, the Institute of Business Forecasting, the Institute of Management Consultants, and a Trusted Advisor member of Vistage an international organization for CEO’s. Ara has an MBA with a specialization in Strategic and Entrepreneurial Management from the University of Illinois, and Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Northeastern University in Boston.
* Please note: This entry originally referred to the DemandCaster as a SaaS application, but has been corrected to “SwaS” to reflect the true nature of the software.
The reason this is important is because SaaS solutions are typically hosted subscription based solutions that are available to users to use as if it was software loaded on their servers or desktop. The distinction with DemandCaster is that it benefits from all that traditional SaaS applications provide but acts as an enabler to allow the deployment of an actual service offering that is provided by a dedicated expert. This differs from another software category called Software plus Services which is a wholly software-centric solution. SwaS does not apply to a business that uses software to simply supplement their core business such as banks, brokers, on-line retailers, and credit card companies. A SwaS provider works in the business to business realm and uses the hosted software as an enabler to facilitate communication, analysis, and delivery to address a specific need of a client company.
It would come as no surprise to me if entrepreneurs collectively named confidence as both their most dangerous and valuable personality trait. This trait can provide the drive necessary to achieve unimaginable goals, but it can also cause the bearer to promise results they aren’t 100% sure they can deliver.
Marc Schreiber (owner of DIVD Corporation and serial entrepreneur) often does just that. Is he setting himself up for failure? Nope. Why not you ask? He has a secret weapon that helps him remain calm in moments that would probably cause others to panic. His weapon is Lextech.
Recently, Marc’s company DIVD Corporation struck up a deal with AT&T to create and deliver 500 interactive kiosks (aka emerging media stations or EMS) according to a very aggressive timeline. The deadline was unrealistic, but he signed on the dotted line anyway because he had faith Lextech would help him keep his word.
What did Lextech do?
Lextech engineers worked around the clock to complete the EMS architecture and clone 500 kiosks to be distributed to AT&T stores nationwide. Lextech provided DIVD with a dependable system before they reached their AT&T deadline. The system not only met their immediate needs, it also has the capability to grow and change along with their future marketing goals. Our systems support team is now responsible for ongoing Tier 1 and Tier 2 support, as well as content updates and testing.
What is the big deal?
For AT&T this translates into faster kiosk updates and seamless transitions between content pushes. For DIVD, this means focusing on the core business while Lextech sweats the technological details.
For Marc, this means he can dream big and know that Lextech has his back.
Lextech refuses to employ some of the less imaginative sales tactics used by other growing companies. For example, we don’t use obnoxious sales pitches or interrupt families gathered around the dinner table by cold calling them. Why? Because we have faith in our work.
We believe that we can only be as successful as we make our clients. If our clients are successful and happy with the work Lextech has done, they will tell their friends. And they have!
100% of our clients to date were referred to us by previous clients or friends.
This referral helps us immediately establish a higher level of trust and a close working relationship. When our clients trust us, they are more likely to share their real business challenges and pain points - making Lextech more effective at designing custom solutions.
We don’t simply want to be the systems engineering company you trust with your business. We want to be the friend you would trust with the business you have financed by taking out a second mortgage on your family home.
Lextech will provide technology expertise for the 2008 Whiteboard Challenge held on June 17th. This event gives local applicants an opportunity to present their innovative ideas to members of the Chicago entrepreneurial community and a chance win a $5,000 prize courtesy of Bell, Boyd & Lloyd.
Presenters have 5 minutes to describe their innovative idea, business concept or solution to a known problem to a panel of experts using an interactive whiteboard system. Lextech will provide the interactive systems and act as a technology resource. Recording devices will be set up on the whiteboards to capture and display each presenterʼs notes and drawings on additional screens.
“As an active member of the Chicagoland entrepreneurial community, Lextech understands the need to encourage new innovations and novel ideas that can be the catalyst for future growth,” says Program Leader of Early Market Partners, Inc. David Smith, “We are delighted to have their involvement in the 2008 Whiteboard Challenge as a demonstration of their commitment to the vitality of our local technology community.”
Submit your innovation or learn more about the event at http://www.mitefchicago.org. Applications are due by May 18, 2008. Final presenters will be selected by a team of experienced entrepreneurs by June 2, 2008.
Office Express President, Bill Raspe’s e-commerce website experienced 3 to 4 days of downtime per month. Maintaining, updating, and adding new features to the website was incredibly difficult and often impossible because the vendor gave Bill limited access to the back end of his system.
He wanted to change vendors and upgrade the system, but because a large portion of an e-commerce company’s business is generated through internet searches, the old website URLs had to remain live to maintain search engine rankings once the new site went up. The success of his business hinged on a smooth upgrade.
What did Lextech do?
Lextech’s systems engineers started by converting the old Microsoft ASP website on a shared server to open source technologies on a dedicated (private and secure) server, which was more cost effective. Project engineers even trained Office Express personnel in the PHP programming language, so they could make changes and updates to the site whenever they wanted. Lextech engineers also followed a very structured plan to link the old website back to the new one and test each link in various search engines. The search engine rankings remained intact.
What is the big deal?
Limited access, excessive downtime, and costly licensing fees are unacceptable barriers to growth. Office Express said sayonara to their crappy vendor, and welcomed Lextech’s cooperative methodology. Since the upgrade, envelopesexpress.com’s conversion ratio has improved by 60%.
After years of business and technology strategizing with us, VR66 received the financial backing they needed to transform their video delivery pilot into a revenue generating product with international appeal.
VR66’s product is a video delivery platform that trickle downloads video messages to desktop PC’s outside the web browser, so users can view content on or off line. Think YouTube - plus better video quality, minus the effort it takes to visit the website. The current video content consists of movie trailers and commentary.
What did Lextech do?
Alex (our CEO) personally took on the role of VR66 technology advisor and part-time CTO, while Lextech engineers dove into the development process. They started by re-architecting the VR66 system to provide scalability, fault-tolerance and system redundancy.
The update took the system from 2 servers to 20 including implementation of web load balancers, live server fail-over and a database cluster to remove any single points of failure. The new infrastructure was then load tested to verify that it would handle 2+ million users and deliver terabytes of video data daily.
What’s the big deal?
The system upgrades allowed VR66 to launch their business, making significant progress on their path to profitability. In early January, they successfully launched the Trailer Room on Cinemas Online in the United Kingdom. May holds possible launch dates in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Mainland China. Congrats VR66!!
