Pixion Wins Best of Show at Macworld
Company’s Latest Honor is Second Major Award for PictureTalk Web Conferencing Product
 

Pixion had a packed house for its presentations at January's Macworld show at Moscone Center in San Francisco.

By George Walsh
Network Editor

Pixion, a developer of web conferencing solutions for businesses with the need to engage in secure, scalable, and cost-effective interactive web meetings was awarded “Best of Show” at this year’s Macworld Conference & Expo in San Francisco for its PictureTalk 4.0 Web conferencing product. The award comes on the heels of winning Presentations Magazine’s prestigious Standing Ovation Award for the “Best Web Conferencing/Meeting Service of 2002” in December of last year. Pixion, located at 4234 Hacienda Drive, Suite 200 in Hacienda, was founded in 1995 and employs 45 people at its Pleasanton facility.

Pixion’s PictureTalk web conferencing software lets users communicate using data, digital content, software and voice over the internet or corporate computer network. It also works with existing firewall technologies to provide multiple layers of protection so that confidential business information remains secure. Pixion says that PictureTalk can be used for efforts that include sales, marketing, technical support, and customer care, as well as training and distance education without incurring travel costs or renting special facilities. “PictureTalk allows anyone on any platform, including any version of Windows, any version of the Macintosh, and any version of Sun Solaris, to share and interact on documents, presentations, software applications, web pages, or the desktop from anywhere in the world with nothing more than an Internet connection,” says Charles Orlando, director of marketing for Pixion.

PictureTalk has been available since 1997, with the award-winning version 4.0 launching in October 2002. Sales of the conferencing product have been growing astronomically over the past year, with the product’s customer base increasing about 1,000% in the last 12 months. The award from Macworld is expected to accelerate acceptance from the Macintosh community. “The traction we now have with the Mac users of the world now is tremendous,” Orlando says. “Traffic to our web site more than quintupled the day that we received the award.” The Standing Ovation Award from Presentations Magazine has also helped to propel PictureTalk into the limelight. Presentations Magazine is an industry-leading trade publication dedicated exclusively to individuals and organizations that create and deliver presentations.

In addition to PictureTalk’s cross-platform capabilities, Orlando also touts its low cost and ease of installation. “Editors and analysts alike are heralding us as the future of web conferencing. We can get you up and running behind your firewall in 90 minutes or less and it’s very inexpensive compared to other products and services. A ten-seat license for PictureTalk runs $6,625 per year. So the cost savings versus travel is also significant.”
 

Cents and Sensibility Helps You Make Sense of Your Dollars
Holistic Approach to Financial Planning Looks at the Big Picture
 

Erin Kincheloe and Sharon Almeida started Cents and Sensibility in 2000, after the pair had worked together at another firm.

By George Walsh
Network Editor

Enlisting the advice and help of a financial planner can help you to prepare for your monetary future, whether you’re thinking about retirement, buying a house, or sending a child to college. However, in choosing someone to help to plan, it’s important to find a planner or firm that can look at your individual situation and help you to target the financial goals that you think are important. This requires a personal relationship between the financial advisor and the client-something that Cents and Sensibility thinks is very important.

Cents and Sensibility was started in 2000 by Erin Kincheloe, who has been in the financial services business for 17 years, and Sharon Almeida, who has been in the business for 16 years. The two, who were co-workers at another firm, decided to go into business together based on the fact that they had a lot of things in common in terms of how they wanted to approach financial services and their clients. They opened their office in Hacienda at 5976 W. Las Positas Blvd. Suite 214 in July 2002.

Cents and Sensibility provides both commission-based and fee-based financial services, as well as educational seminars. “We do a lot of retirement planning and investment planning,” says Almeida, president of Cents and Sensibility. “We take a very comprehensive approach to financial planning. We're always looking at the bigger picture, including issues around tax planning, risk management, estate planning and how they all tie together. For most people, one of their biggest goals is retirement planning, so that often takes the leading focus.”

In addition to offering one-on-one financial planning, Cents and Sensibility also presents seminars to educate people about financial issues. “We’ve done seminar in a variety of different places on a number of topics,” says Kincheloe, director of educational services for the company. “We go out to schools to put on a session for educators to help them learn how they can plan for a successful retirement using their particular benefits. We also have a seminar called Financial Wellness For Women that we’ve presented at community centers, universities, and credit unions.”

While Cents and Sensibility serves many male clients and families, Almeida and Kincheloe consider their company to be “female friendly.” “Our approach is more of a relational approach to money as opposed to an analytical approach,” Kincheloe says. “Obviously, Sharon and I have to be very analytical in what we do for the clients, but our approach when people come in is very relational. What do you want to do in your life? Where do you want to go? What other things are important to you? Tell us about your dreams for your family. We find it’s really a very female approach to life and also to money.”

Cents and Sensibility values its relationships with its customers, which is evidenced by the company’s size. “We actually are a relatively small firm and we stay that way by design,” Kincheloe says. “Currently, we have Sharon and I as the advisors, doing the seminars and giving the actual financial advice and two other employees. It’s not really our goal to be a 100-person office. We know all our clients, we know all their stories, and we know their lives.” When it comes to planning your financial future, the more your advisor knows about you, the better.