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Visioneer
Aims Intelligent Imaging Solutions at Healthcare
Efficiencies
By Nicole Zaro Stahl Committed to “producing products that solve real problems,” Hacienda tenant Visioneer Inc. has a promising opportunity in the national push to streamline healthcare. As a leading developer of “intelligent imaging solutions,” Visioneer’s value proposition lies in the way its proprietary technology integrates with other software programs to deliver OneTouch scanning. The process requires little more than a mouse click to incorporate paper-based data or images into a company’s workflow system. Reducing a once-complex operation into a single automated step generates remarkable productivity gains. “Not only are documents scanned without disrupting the flow of other programs on the computer, but OneTouch automatically loads them onto the desktop so the scanned image or text can be dragged and dropped right into the desired application. Users don’t have to learn anything new,” explains Visioneer Vice President and CFO Greg Elder. The supreme ease-of-use is a key differentiator in today’s market, and an especially welcome feature when cost-cutting is the order of the day for most businesses. “Customers are looking to mine more value from their existing enterprise systems,” adds Vice President and Chief Information Officer Walt Thinfen. A solution like Visioneer’s, which streamlines operations without a major investment, is very attractive. Visioneer has spent the past decade building on its OneTouch technology, first introduced in 1997. Many enhancements have resulted from partnerships with the producers of large enterprise applications like SAP and Adobe, as well as attention to the types of business problems encountered day to day. The company is looking forward to applying the same approach to information management in the healthcare arena. “Right now there are several types of archiving software that don’t talk to each other. Different standards do not make much sense for consumers. Our strategy is to develop commonality so we will be at the forefront of this new virtual world,” Thinfen says. A few years ago Thinfen started to build a community of Silicon Valley CEOs and CIOs to help reflect on how the company visualizes its future applications. One byproduct of the collective feedback is a OneTouch application that vastly simplifies the management of expense and travel reports. The new system extends the OneTouch approach to once-only handling of the physical input--receipts, for instance. Thinfen explains that converting paper into digital form at the point of entry eliminates the multiple touch points in the standard document lifecycle. Collecting and copying receipts, manually filling in forms, sending a stack of paper to others to process--all these steps take time and cost money. Once digitized, the data are searchable, as well as permanently attached to the originating form, joined by what Thinfen describes as a “digital staple,” and always available for review. Practicing what it preaches, Visioneer’s Hacienda office at 5673 Gibraltar Drive is highly automated, thanks to the company’s own technology integration. The facility includes a Solutions Center, where Thinfen continues to invite local CIOs for a tour and a “productive exchange of ideas.” For more information, call him at (925) 251-6350 or visit www.visioneer.com. iWorks Media Creates
Online Identities for Retailers, Other
Businesses
By Nicole Zaro Stahl Image counts, especially in the intensely visual online world, a point iWorks Media frequently emphasizes with its clients. The team working at the branding and interactive design firm, at 5990 Stoneridge Drive, has more than 15 years experience in marketing in all media. For the biggest to the smallest companies, “the key to our success has been our creators and graphic designers who come up with the right type of images,” notes marketing designer Brian Aris. iWorks started about two years ago in Pleasanton and worked virtually until moving into its Hacienda office last year. It is an outgrowth of another company, Xtudio Productions, which previously operated a 10,000-square-foot, “beautifully designed,” and well-equipped studio in Modesto for film, entertainment, and voice recording. Then the market started to change. “We saw the one area that was always busy was web design. It is something that people always need help with. In business you are either doing well or not, and in both cases you need marketing to survive,” he reasons. With its new focus on the online environment, the company has honed a design style that Aris describes as “kind of in-your-face, can’t-miss eye candy.” He admits that it is very aggressive, but “aggressive marketing is a good thing in this business,” he insists. “You need the right campaign to get you the right results.” With each project his team puts in many hours studying the type of business from every angle. “We bookmark 50 to 100 different web sites in the same field to see what’s best, and then we show our clients how to benefit by giving them something better than the competition—a much more appealing design.” Images are what the agency’s clients rely on to distinguish themselves from the competition. “You need to have a Wow! factor to the website,” Aris states, pointing out that normal viewers spend between one to three seconds on a site before clicking away if they don’t find anything of interest. “You have to catch their attention. The site has to be user friendly and it should be easy to make a purchase. People avoid confusing sites,” he adds. The company must also appear trustworthy. “Credibility is everything. We had one client with $26 million in inventory, but the look of his site was low-end, and it just didn’t reflect the resources they had. When people rely on visuals to make a judgment, the design has to be very creative.” One sector seeing a lot of activity right now is the online reseller. “It’s pretty easy for a client to do a starter business online and get it going at minimal expense, right out of the home.” Aris says. No matter what the product, the strategy is the same: get a higher ranking among search engines and have a more compelling electronic storefront. “It’s a great opportunity to make money without investing much in infrastructure,” he observes. For more information, visit www.iworksmedia.com or call the iWorks office at (925) 468 0240. |
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| Last modified: May 04 2010 06:34:20 Copyright © 2010 HBPOA |
