Further to my previous post, I believe I cracked the conundrum attached to e-invoicing today! Now, do not get too excited, as I have not decided whether I am going to do anything about it. Most likely, I will park it for the time being. But let’s explore what the problem is in the first place.

What is the biggest problem faced by the e-invoicing (EIPP) market?

I argue that at the very top is the lack of market penetration. Paper documents continue to rule. Some of these are now replaced by e-mail attachments, but this does not solve the fundamental problem of duplication of effort. I do not believe OB10 will be able to crack this market as they think they will, whilst remaining independent. I am not holding much faith on JP Morgan Chase Xign and Amex Harbour Payments as the entities to conquer the world. I strongly believe that a new startup with deep brain storming can crack this market easily. So, who will this be?

I believe I found the answer. It’s a company that is not currently involved in the market place. It’s a company that probably do not even understand what I am talking about let alone what e-invoicing truly means. But they have the potential to revolutionise (not evolutionise) the market and become the dominant player within three years of starting. They alone can make e-invoicing truly happen. And it took me well over 3 years to realise this. And the answer was right in front of my eyes all this time. Man, have I been stupid! edocr actually helped me put the puzzle pieces together. I was on M56 when this realisation kicked in. It was exhilarating…and the speedometer certainly showed my joy – 3 digits!

I already worked out the business plan – real fag packet stuff (never smoked and never will be). The revenue model + product road map + distribution/channels strategy + the lot . Strangely, no real marketing effort will be required. Very simple. Too good to be true! That’s why it is so convincing, and therefore do-able

Now the question is what am I going to do with this knowledge! I have not got a clue…I suppose I could always talk to them. Perhaps…Do I want to? Let me think about this over next few days and weeks…It’s no point waking a sleeping giant without a clear strategy of education, don’t you agree.

Technorati Tags: e-invoicing, EIPP, OB10, JP Morgan Chase, Xign, Harbour Payments, American Express

Let me first clarify what I meant by e-invoicing here. It is not about scanning and OCRing paper invoices with tight integration of accounts payable systems. It is about connecting disparate finance and procurement systems seamlessly, so that an electronic document (purchase-to-payment and supply-to-cash) from one system flows automatically to another system owned by the same or separate organisation without duplication of effort. At its very basic level, avoiding retyping of data created by the originating system. In my mind, you can only achieve this through a electronic document exchange hub. A prime example is OB10 (in the case of OB10, with limitations).

What I realised over the last few days is that once you bite the e-invoicing (EIPP) bug, you can never really get away from it. What I mean here is that those rare individuals who got the guts or sheer lunacy to setup businesses around the concept of e-invoicing, never really give up. Their first attempt may fail drastically. But they will find a way to have another crack at the market. This is certainly true of Mark Morahan. In Mark’s case, it may well be the third attempt. He may argue that it’s the second attempt as the second attempt was never reached conclusion. In my case, I had my first experience. Obviously, I am not counting my involvement with Mark in 2004, as I was not responsible for setting up Morahan International.

Since ending the development of ebdex Document Exchange at the back-end of 2006, I had numerous offers by technology firms and technologists to develop the platform in exchange for shares, etc. It is hard to ignore such suggestions, but I always remember the words of my mentor, late Gerry Lemberg. If you want to be successful, you need to have the connectivity up and down the value chain. It is not just about funding. You must have access to that large client, who is going to trial it for you. You are not likely to make money out of this, but that is not the point. I believe OB10 had this break with their first client. You also need to have access to your suppliers. Every time I was approached, none of them satisfied this vital requirement. I am also no longer prepared to boot-strap with another e-invoicing startup.

So, it was strange to receive a call from an ex-colleague few days back, who was involved in the e-invoicing startup scene several years ago but left it due to similar problems I described above. How weird! As they say, there is no harm in having a coffee! Give me a call, if you are listening as I no longer have your contact details.

Currently, I am inspired by two individuals:

Rhys Jones of Accountis, sanoodi and edocr

I like his concept of having a pipeline of companies. His sweet spot is in setting up and nurturing a startup to revenue generation. He acknowledges that others are better experienced to turn these startups in to high growth companies. He has so far exited from two companies successfully. With number of other startups under his belt, his game now is to accelerate this process.

Whilst I cannot demonstrate the same level of success, I have now setup three complementary businesses; edocr (document interactivity platform), eveo (event management using edocr for event collaboration) and evigon (consultancy and advisory services providing number of services using eveo and edocr, where possible).

Simon Grice of ideas.org and mashupevents

For some weird reason, Simon’s strategy makes sense. He has now consolidated his interests into a single organisation, ideas.org. This company services all of his other interests – the core team and therefore core competencies reside with a single organisation – a simple yet a very powerful concept. Unfortunately, I am behind in replicating this strategy.

edocr, eveo and evigon are three separate entities with different people involved. If the deal (currently in discussion with key member) goes through with evigon, evigon can provide accountancy services for all three entities. All three entities uses the same legal counsel. What is missing is development capabilities Simon has in-house.

My friendly development team is Ixis IT, who are inundated with projects. There is no way for me to bring them on board, as they are very successfull in their own right. So, the game plan has to be to develop this expertise over time. Outsourcing will never work unless resources are dedicated to serve my interests. One draw back with this strategy is that unlike for Simon, software development is an alien process for me. Looks like it will take a while for me to work this one out! Any suggestions

 

It has become very easy to setup a legal entity, and I thought of sharing some of the activities you need to undertake if you are thinking of starting a business. Here goes:

1. Decide on company name.
2. Check companies house to ensure the availability of the company name.
3. Make sure the URL is available.
4. Register the company – I used Company4less, which costs £20
5. Register the URL – I used 123reg
6. Register for VAT – takes about a month
7. Open bank account – takes an hour with HSBC – it helps if they know you
8. Find an accountant – this will be a service that evigon will provide – watch the space
9. Find a legal adviser – can help if you are in the North West
10. Find an office – if you are a digital startup in the North West, I recommend Daresbury Innovation Centre. If you wish an office in Manchester, I recommend eOffice
11. Design a logo – plan to use logomaker. Any suggestions?
12. Get the website up quickly – recommend Ixis IT, if you want a great site using Drupal CMS.
13. Find a hosting partner for your website – again, recommend Ixis IT

Nothing new there, but the process is quite simple. What is harder is choosing a company name! It is most likely, the URL associated with your first choice will not be available. Be prepared to burn several hours in finding a URL that exists. My constraints were:

1. Company name must start with an “e”
2. Must be a cracking name

The lesser the constraints, the easier your job will be.

I created evigon with two thoughts in mind, these being:

• Provide a vehicle for my advisory and consultancy activities
• Allow other services to be provided through a flexible entity

It is very early days to write too much about evigon, but I hope I will have some news to share shortly. Until then…

 

ebdex was formed on 25th Nov 2004 with the idea of disrupting the EIPP market dominated by Accountis and OB10. To be fair, OB10 and Accountis had very low market penetration then (and same is true now). But they were the best examples an ambitious startup could look upon. Causeway’s Tradex and Burns e-Commerce’s Bex were ignored due to various reasons. Number of other models were studied including Ariba, Xign, Harbour Payments, Esker, etc.

At the time, the idea was to develop a product that harnessed the best of Accountis and OB10. The key ingredient taken from OB10 was the hub based architecture. From Accountis, it was the purchase-to-pay and supply-to-cash documents with built-in BACStel-IP payment engine. Accountis was really helpful in guiding us to understand how to build the ebdex Document Exchange. And they did not even know they were helping us.

But fundamental to all this is Mr. Mark Morahan of Morahan UK Ltd (plus Morahan International, etc). I bought in to Mark’s vision of the electronic document exchange concept whilst completing my Executive MBA at Manchester Business School. Mark’s vision was to develop an exchange (he called this MI Document Network) that was simple to use and understand. The idea was to charge both parties of a transaction (supplier and buyer) 25p with no set-up fees or annual maintenance fees. Quite the opposite to Accountis and OB10, not to mention the rest of the market! However, whilst it sounds great on paper, delivery was quite a different story. And this remains the fundamental problem with the concept of e-invoicing to date!

Having studied the incumbents’ models, ebdex looked at ways to innovate and therefore differentiate from the rest with the idea of achieving a sustainable competitive advantage over time. I believe we found a way, which I have not yet seen in any of the products in the market today. Unfortunately, just like Morahan UK Ltd, the company I outsourced to developed ebdex Document Exchange, Affno, could not deliver the technology! Whilst nothing good can be said about Suren and his Affno, various software associations in Sri Lanka continue to promote their works by granting them prestigious awards! How ironical is that?

At the end of 2006, it was the crunch time for ebdex. Do I accept £250,000 debt finance and continue to burn cash hoping Affno will eventually deliver or cut the losses and walk away? At the end, I took the wise decision and accepted that its time to stop beating a dead horse.

In 2007, I attempted to turnaround ebdex into a niche consultancy, but found this extremely difficult due to the past finances of ebdex. What I should have done was to terminate ebdex at the end of 2006 and create a new entity to exploit advisory opportunities. I was emotionally attached to the ebdex brand – with the hope that one day, I will be able to rebuild ebdex document exchange. Letting go was hard. But recently, someone has forced me to make this decision. So it is time to say good bye to ebdex. In the short term, ebdex will remain as a dormant company.

Looking back, I learnt a tremendous amount from ebdex, especially to do with outsourcing. It’s time to let go…Goodbye ebdex…

Technorati Tags: Mark Morahan, Ariba, Xign, JP Morgan Chase, American Express, Esker, Accountis, OB10, ebdex Document Exchange, ebdex, Rhys Jones, Affno, Suren Kannangara

As you very well know, I have been running events for the Digital StartUp Community in the North of England for over 15 months. Whilst these events hardly make any commercial sense, I am convinced that they can grow to become a worth while business over time. In order to achieve this, the business of running events need to be released from the current chaotic environment. With this in mind, some of my network buddies and I have come together to create a new venture, eveo Ltd. I will write more about this later on.

Technorati Tags: Events, Seminars, Exhibitions, Conferences, NWStartUp20, Northern StartUp 2.0

Billentis, a company run by highly-respected ExPP evangelist Bruno Koch, is the latest service provider operating in the e-invoicing market to join edocr, your favourite business document interactivity portal. The document below gives an overview of the European e-invoicing and e-billing market:

Following document highlights successful e-invoicing network models:

What’s stopping you taking advantage of edocr free of charge today?  Some of the other’s taking advantage of edocr includes:

• Accountis
• Ariba
• CashTech (part of FundTech and sister company of Accountis)
• Causeway Technologies
• Crossgate Group
• United Data

Technorati Tags: edocr, Billentis, Bruno Koch, e-billing, e-invoicing, EIPP, EBPP, ExPP

edocr plans to attend the StartUp Camp on 7th and 8th March sponsored by Sun Microsystems, and co-hosted by:

This is our first time at a StartUp Camp. According to event organisers:

“Startup Camp is an unconference which means you get to decide what the session content is. If you’re thinking of coming to Startup Camp London and want to suggest some discussion topics, you’re welcome to list them on a special page that we’ve set aside on the wiki for such discussion proposals”

So far, over 130 individuals have registered for the event. Some of these include Northerners:

• Katie Lips, Treasuremytext, Launched Startup, blog
• Guy Dickinson, Pre-Launch Startup, blog
• Paul Robinson, Vagueware Ltd, Technology Provider, blog

Having spend over 3 yrs in the digital startup segment, I am hoping that I would get a time slot to share my experience and learn from others. I expect to cover the following areas:

• Soft launching a digital startup under £1000 cash investment
• Document interactivity portal – 3 applications from Knowledge Exchange, Marketing Communications Channel for Lead Generation, Event Collaboration
• Learning from catastrophic stupidity
• Not putting all eggs in the same basket
• Is success guaranteed this time? Hell, yes!

As a media partner, edocr has also provided a special interest group (SIG) to capture the conversation through documents (slide packs, press releases, product info, white papers, case studies, etc) and forum. This is a pilot we are running with Sun Microsystems to demonstrate the benefit edocr could bring to event organisers.

If you are an event organiser, why not get in touch to explore how you could add value to your event and differentiate from the crowd?

Technorati Tags: StartUp Camp, edocr, Vagueware, Treasuremytext, thinkfold, google, sun microsystems

The next Northern StartUp 2.0 event is almost upon us. This time bringing the North’s premier telecommunications community together for one evening. Held one week after 3GSM Barcelona, the event aims to update the progress made within the last year and debate on the forthcoming technologies. Without further ado, here is the introduction from Imran Ali, ex-Deputy to Strategy Director of Orange:

Introduction

The umbrella term Web 2.0 provided a helpful framework for understanding various intersecting and overlapping trends, business models and design patterns across the internet industry. Despite the exponential growth of mobile communication and computing, Mobile 2.0 doesn’t describe an similarly epochal shift in mobility. The mobile industry remains mired in structural issues ranging from 3G debt to closed business and technology models…and yet carries a promise of reshaping culture, technology and business much more so than the web alone.

Openmoko, Google’s Android, Apple’s iPhone, Nokia’s Trolltech acquisition, new ethnographic research and ‘the next billion’ customers in emerging markets all point to a increasing entanglement of the Web and mobility.

• Are mobiles simply windows into Kevin Kelly’s One Machine and the wider web?
• Should we consider the web and mobile web as distinct?
• Do we design for mobiles or mobility?
• What do people really desire from mobile technology and services?
• Are mobiles really what computers have become?

Understanding the future of mobility is about asking the right questions, postulating scenarios and deeply understanding the motivations of users – something the industry has singularly failed to do.

Mobile 2.0 seeks to explore these scenarios and questions with a range of speakers drawn from the communications industry; including thought leaders, investors and senior management. We hope you’ll join us in sharing their thoughts.

Moderator

Robert Wakeling, CEO – Robert is the founder of Wadaro Limited and has been principle in early business development, in securing support from partners & advisors and prospective investors.  Prior to Wadaro, Robert held executive management positions at Openwave Inc. (NASDAQ:OPWV) and Magic4 Limited (acquired by OPWV).  In his time at these two companies, Robert conceived a number of products now shipping in over a quarter of a billion mobile phones world-wide and is putting his industry knowledge and contacts to good use at Wadaro.

Speakers

Speaker 1 – Dr. Norman Lewis   Wireless Grids Corporation – Chief Strategy Officer

Prior to joining WGC, Norman Lewis was the Director of Technology Research, Orange UK plc, (formerly the Home Division, France Telecom). In this role and prior to that as the founder and Director of Globalisation and Power in the Twenty First Century (1997) he has been a strategic pioneer in crafting innovation frameworks for the future application of information and communication technologies in society. Norman has a global reputation as an excellent communicator and inspirational presenter, with the ability to explain complex questions to a wide range of audiences. He has a robust track record of being able to focus, develop and mobilise a team around a set of objectives. His research team while at Orange were recognised as Internet thought-leaders across the world. Throughout his career, he has combined a passion for technology and people with a professionalism that has included extensive commitments in the private and public sphere, in voluntary as well as commercial environments. He is currently the Chairman of the ITU’s TELECOM Programme Committee and has acted as a consultant to the World Intellectual Property Organisation. He holds a PhD in International Relations from the University of Sussex (UK) and has lectured at several Universities in the UK including Sussex, the University of Kent, Canterbury and Oxford.

Speaker 2 – Ed French Rising Stars – Enterprise Ventures – Investment Directot

Edward joined EV in 2002, initially to help set up the RisingStars Growth Fund and later to assess and complete technology investments. Edward has assessed several hundred business propositions and has completed investments to date mainly in software and medical technology. Prior to joining EV, Edward ran a technology transfer business based at the University of Bradford where he completed numerous licence deals and patents, and founded, and funded seven new spin-out companies, mainly in Telecoms, Medical Technology and Software. Edward served as Chairman of Unico, the University Companies Association, which deals with issues associated with creating spin-out companies from University technology. During this time Edward gained useful exposure to building technology business teams, IP strategy work and financing, building upon the experience before Bradford of managing product development, sales and manufacturing in a number of engineering businesses. Edward won a sponsorship from the National Engineering Laboratory to study Engineering Science at Cambridge, and has an MBA from the Bradford School of Management.

Speaker 3 – Paul Sandham Sanoodi

Convergent & participative technologies strategist & Technical Programme Manager. I have been involved in some of the murkier and less glamorous facets of the internet since 1994. From Application formulation, design, implementation and delivery through to setting up and running global 24/7 support operations. I have proposed and managed successful and viable organisational data quality/business intelligence projects in conjunction with KTP, and have been instrumental in setting up, testing and managing the accreditation of new on-line and real world card based payment systems and methods. I have as a result of the above set up and directed a number of development teams over the last decade. I have in addition successfully project managed a number of large building & organisational move projects. I have prepared and delivered presentations in the US and the UK on designing and developing Internet based applications, Participative technologies, Data quality & Information, & Business Continuity.

Speaker 4 – Tim Panton – Westhawk

Tim Panton has been a software developer for more than 25 years, working on a diverse range of projects, from chemical plant simulation to tourism web sites. He is also a contributor to open source projects, in particular GJTAPI a framework for implementing JTAPI (The Java Telephony API) and Westhawk’s Java SNMP stack. In recent years Tim has been predominantly involved in Asterisk development and implementation, working closely with key industry players he has been championing innovative integration of voice technologies in the social networking market for PhoneFromHere.com.

 

Programme

18:00 to 18:30 Registration
18:30 to 19:00 Networking
19:00 to 20:00 Speeches
20:00 to 20:15 Break
20:15 to 21:00 Panel Discussion

Cost

Cost to attend this event is £25 (£10 for students with valid student union card). Payment options are:

+ Pay at door
+ Bank transfer – Account Details: Account No. 01250841 Sort code 40-17-06 reference “NS20-08Feb”

Speeches:

+ Norman Lewis –

+ Eric Hobson – How consumers use mobiles and trends; a window on the future – Korea and Japan; the distribution landscape, Operators, Handset Manufacturers, D2C; technical constraints to Mobile 2.0 and how the are breaking down; the migration of Web 2.0 services to mobile

+ Paul Sandham – Dichotomy 2.0 – The participative web and advertising. Sanoodi, based in Snowdonia, North Wales is already an established Google maps mashup site that supports the recording of A to B outdoor activities such as; running, cycling, walking and mountain biking. Its growing community of over 12000 unique users have in its first year created 50,000 routes on six continents, routes that already cover over a million miles! Since version 1 moved from Beta in May last year, little has changed on the current site. Progress behind the scenes, however has been considerable. The Summer of 2007 has seen an entirely new application being developed in Bangor in consultation with a number of global players in the Mobile Internet and GIS sectors. The new site, API and mobile device applications (SMDA) are currently in private beta testing and will be made available as a public beta in March. The strategic aims of Sanoodi have remained consistent throughout this phase of its development: “Build the community, don’t clutter the site with ads, and be operationally efficient.” We will briefly describe how this strategy is being delivered and developed across convergent technologies whilst ensuring that Sanoodi has the ability a to sustain a growing, easily manageable revenue stream.
by focusing specifically the following aspects: The evolution of the Sanoodi community, application and web-site. Dealing effectively with the dichotomy of web 2.0 and advertising Mobile Sanoodi. Paul Sandham is the senior snood at Sanoodi

+ Tim Panton – Tim will be discussing some technological changes, which may shape the future of Mobile 2.0. These jigsaw pieces include: Web 2.0 changes in expectations, the imminent launch of the .tel Top level domain, the increasing programmability of iPhone and Android, and improvements in loudspeaker technology. Tim will try to indicate how these parts might come together and form a whole.

+ Ed French – Investor’s view point of 3GSM Barcelona – The Mobile Congress

Summary

A cracking line of speakers, a cracking venue and a cracking date! We love to see you there. Registration is through here. You need to open a free account first. Any problems, let me know your details and I will register you to the event personally.