Press Releases
Duncan Welcomes SMBLive to Montgomery County; Company launches innovative sofware product
For Immediate Release: Monday, February 27, 2006
Montgomery County Executive Douglas M. Duncan and officials from the Montgomery County Business Incubator Program today welcomed SMBLive, an innovative software development and web marketing automation company, to the County’s Business Incubator Program. SMBLive has opened in the Maryland Technology Development Center, 9700 Great Seneca Highway, Rockville, MD, one of the County’s two high-tech business incubators.
At an event held at the MTDC, the company also unveiled a suite of simple, inexpensive and easy-to-use software solutions designed to meet the needs of small business customers who are increasingly using the web to find, try and buy on-demand applications that are cost effective and efficient.
“The innovative solutions and software being developed by SMBLive are perfect fits for the dynamic atmosphere we try to foster in our high tech business incubators,” said Duncan. “When we created our Business Incubator Program, the goal was to attract and to assist entrepreneurs as they develop products that will revolutionize the way we live our lives. Our ability to attract the creative minds at SMBLive and to have them here in our county shows that we are meeting that goal,” Duncan said. “I am confident they will achieve great success, and we look forward to working with them to ensure they grow and expand here in Montgomery County.”
SMBLive's products consist of a suite of on-demand solutions built on the Microsoft SharePoint Platform designed to improve and simplify the SharePoint user interface, navigational experience and functionality set. By using SMBWorks, small business users can easily administer intranets and extranets, manage documents and discussions, and coordinate projects without the expense or commitment of corporate IT. With SMBApps, small business customers have immediate access to fast, easy, and affordable business applications that work for managing sales, marketing, customer service, finance, and HR processes.
“From product development to licensing to marketing and distribution channels, the software industry is undergoing a significant transformation -- especially as it relates to how small businesses are using the Internet and tools like Google to buy software,'' said Matt Howard, Chief Executive Officer of SMBLive.
“Small businesses are increasingly comfortable with buying software as a service over the Internet, rather than buying software on a CD that they must install and maintain,” Howard said.
“And, most small businesses don't have the IT resources to complete that installation and maintenance in the first place. The mission of SMBLive is to improve the productivity of small businesses by developing affordable and easy-to-use software solutions that 'just work' without IT intervention.”
The suite of SMBLive solutions has been developed with core features focused on how small businesses really work, including:
There are more than 10 million small businesses in North America and the United Kingdom with fewer than 100 employees. Recent Microsoft research indicates that these small businesses have an urgent need for easy-to-use and low-cost solutions that will help them to centralize project and document management functions, improve customer service and support, enable their sales teams, securely provision partner and customer Extranets, and administer HR and finance functions.
“Issues such as how to keep relevant customer data, track sales or manage projects often with external team members were clearly the issues small and mid-size businesses (SMBs) were willing to invest in,” said James Murfin of Microsoft. “SMBLive is a key solution designed to address these issues for SMBs.”
Currently, SMBLive is partnering with a variety of service providers, including Bell Canada, Cobweb Solutions, and CyberTrails, who seek to expand their value proposition with turnkey solutions for their SMB customers. SMBLive has a comprehensive channel reseller program designed specifically to facilitate the marketing of on-demand applications to the IT- less SMB market.
“CyberTrails is constantly looking to deliver more and more value to small and medium businesses,” said Rick Crutchley, CIO of CyberTrails. “We chose to partner with SMBLive because we believe that their easy and affordable business applications add significant complementary value to our portfolio of small business offerings. With SMBLive, we can continue to strengthen and grow our relationship with every customer.”
Companies interested in more partnering with SMBLive can find additional details about SMBLive's channel reseller program at www.smblive.com/partnering.shtml.
For more information on the Montgomery County Business Incubator Program, call the Montgomery Department of Economic Development at 240-777-2000 or log onto ww.montgomerycountymd.gov/ded
Media Contact: Joe Shapiro 240-777-2022