2007/05/27

USWeb info from Wikipedia

I can't fall to sleep tonight and think of the good old days. The original USWeb company bio is even on Wikipedia, and here it is:

USWeb is an Internet marketing company based in Aliso Viejo, California. Originally founded as a Web design company, it expanded during the dot-com boom into consulting and marketing. After several mergers with other companies, its parent company went bankrupt, and USWeb emerged as a separate entity whose focus has now shifted more toward search engine optimization.

The company was founded in 1995 by a group of former Novell executives, Joe Firmage, Toby Corey, and Sheldon Laube. It began taking in venture capital in March 1996 with its first round of financing, and set up a network of affiliated companies that provided website design, content development, and hosting services to clients. With additional capital, USWeb began buying up some of these affiliates and ultimately bought up at least 31 other companies. It also went public with an IPO in 1997.


Merger with CKS

On September 2, 1998, USWeb announced that it would merge with another Internet company, CKS Group. The merger was a stock transaction involving an exchange of 1.5 shares of USWeb stock for each share of CKS. At the time, USWeb was still losing money while CKS had managed to post a profit in its latest quarter. With an estimated value of the transaction approaching $350 million when the deal was announced, the combined market capitalization of the two companies was around $728 million. The news prompted a fall in USWeb's stock price while CKS stock, which had been trading near 52-week lows, rose initially but then fell again.

Among the benefits touted was joining USWeb's technical skills with the marketing savvy of CKS. The merged company was to be renamed Reinvent Communications, but the new name did not stick and the company was generally known as USWeb/CKS or simply USWeb. With the merger, the company had nearly 2,000 employees and important clients including Apple Computer, Levi Strauss, and Harley-Davidson. Both companies had been busy making acquisitions, prompting concerns about integrating these into a single organization and a potential culture clash between former rivals.

Firmage initially became CEO of the combined company with Mark Kvamme, CEO of CKS, as chairman. However, Firmage resigned in November to become chief strategist and was replaced by former Oracle executive Robert Shaw. Firmage then left the company entirely in January 1999, amid reports about his belief in UFOs and extraterrestrial intelligence.

Merger to form MarchFirst

In December 1999, after buying boutique management consulting firm Mitchell Madison Group for over $300 million dollars, USWeb merged with Whittman-Hart, another consulting firm based in Chicago. The combined company, a merger of equals, had over 10,000 employees with annual revenues exceeding $1B. This deal involved Whittman-Hart exchanging 0.865 shares of its stock for each share of USWeb, and another new name as MarchFirst Inc. The new company was headed by Whittman-Hart CEO Robert Bernard. Shaw was announced as chairman, but resigned prior to taking on that role.

With the burst of the dot-com bubble, MarchFirst went into bankruptcy in April 2001 and its assets were liquidated. Some of the units, including USWeb and Whittman-Hart, survived the breakup and re-emerged as separate companies.

References

2007/05/10

Need more software programmer? check this out...

http://blog.darkthread.net/blogs/darkthreadtw/archive/2007/06/30/developers-are-you-underpaid-or-overpaid.aspx

Developers, Are You Underpaid Or Overpaid?
Phil Haack寫了一篇探討開發人員產能差異的好文章。可能是因為自己瘋狂熱愛Coding,一直以來對許多客戶、專案經理、公司主管貶低開發人員價值的錯誤認知頗不以為然,於是,這類的文章讀來格外心有戚戚焉。

對開發人員的種種誤解中,我最痛恨的是以下幾種:

1) 為什麼寫一個線上購物網站要花五十萬? 我小姨子的同事唸高中的兒子說給他五萬元就可以搞一個!

2) 每年多少資管畢業生呀? 程式開發人員去街上抓就一大把,還怕找不到人?

3) 不過就寫程式唄! 找誰來寫還不都一樣? 你專案不是缺人,為什麼不叫隔壁組現在沒事的老王加入你的Team? (Darkthread定律: 連砸了三個案子的人,在撐著不離職前都會很涼)

4) 當黑手寫程式有什麼前途? 把系統分析做好,外包給老印、老中的Programmer才是王道! 別把時間花在這種低層次的工作上

read on.......

Mercury簡易改裝

有同好有一樣的困擾 - 如何使用自己的data logging軟體,因此寫了這篇來分享我的簡易改裝。 Background 雲豆子 MERCURY roaster 烘豆機的設計是使用自行開發的軟體,來:1. 操控風門/火力; 2. data logging/自動烘焙。 ...