By Dennis Chen
For the Northwest Asian Weekly

James Wong is a seasoned entrepreneur and founder of three successful companies. He is presently the co-founder and CEO of Avidian Technologies, the company that created Prophet, an easy-to-use CRM (customer-relationship management) solution built inside Outlook.

Prior to Avidian, Wong was the co-founder and president of Foci Technologies, which in February 2001 was acquired by Meritage Technologies Inc. Wong was responsible for business strategy and operations, including sales and marketing, business development, finance and investor relations. He was a hands-on executive with more than 10 years of experience in information technology, and served as the lead technical architect for Foci. His clients have included Intel, Port of Seattle and Brown & Haley.

Prior to Foci, Wong was an analyst with the consulting firm Andersen, where his clients included Solomon Smith Barney, Daiwa Bank and Sanwa Bank.



Dennis Chen: What makes your company different or unique?

James Wong: I'm interested in building a great company. This time around, it's not about maximizing profits or creating shareholder value. Those things will come when you build an enduring company that adds real value to society. The framework I'm using to build Avidian is taken directly from Good to Great and Built to Last, both written by Jim Collins. As our mission statement states, we are interested in building a great company that is able to attract, develop, excite and retain exceptional people. Another distinguishing factor is that our company is driven by very simple yet powerful concepts. They are: passion for what we do, seeking to be the best in the world at what we do and making an evangelist out of every customer.



Chen: How did you get the idea to start Avidian?

Wong: When creating Avidian, I asked myself what I am passionate about. I am very passionate about helping small businesses succeed. I have been Exchange Server-certified for many years and was one of the first companies to implement Outlook. Throughout the years, my clients kept asking me, "Why can't Outlook do this or do that?" I kept hoping that maybe Microsoft would get it right in the next version. But after five years, they still didn't get it right. There are over 100 million Outlook users out there, and I know there are many out there that wished it acted more like a true CRM application. Therefore, I decided to create one.



Chen: You have picked very interesting names for your company and your product. Why "Avidian" and "Prophet"?

Wong: I wanted a name that started with the letter A so that it would come up first in an alphabetical listing, so I went and bought the biggest dictionary I could find and looked through all of the "A" section.

When I came across the word "avid," I liked the meaning but not the sound. Then, as though by divine inspiration, I thought of Davidian, which means "tribe of David." Thus, why not Avidian and become a tribe of avid technologists? It's pronounceable, easy to spell, meaningful and sounds good.



Chen: Did you know that was how Jeff Bezos picked out the name Amazon? So what about Prophet?

Wong: I wanted something associated with the word Outlook, so I went through much brainstorming. However, because they're trademarked, Outlook Pro and Outlook Plus were not possible unless you wanted to get sued.

One night I was driving on I-405 South and began thinking about a product name. Once again, almost by divine inspiration, I thought of "prophet," a messenger of God that sees the future and is never wrong. I thought certainly "prophet" has more positive connotations then "oracle." I also loved the fact that it sounds like "profit," which is another positive word.



Chen: How did you start your last company?

Wong: With $638, plus over $35,000 in credit-card debt and lots of perseverance. I started the company when I was 24 years old, and everyone thought I was stupid. Many thought I was crazy for leaving such a nice job with such a bright future. I was working for Andersen in New York and living the good life at the time.



Chen: That's a lot of credit-card interest!

Wong: Yes, but fortunately we were able to pay it off in about a year. I'm a believer of "If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything."



Chen: Your last company was tailored for the dot-com era: web development and e-commerce. How does your current company fit into the current economy? What is your strategic vision?

Wong: Our product, Prophet, is perfectly fit for a down economy. We are focused on increasing sales for our customers by helping them treat their customers better and by allowing them to know their customers more intimately.

It's very reasonably priced at $149 per license. Prophet adds value by helping you to know and serve your customers better. We also provide a process for helping professionals manage their sales process. We are not about leading-edge technology, although we do use leading-edge technology, including Microsoft's .NET. The solution is a business solution. We are helping people leverage what they have -- Outlook -- and their understanding of contact management and taking that framework to the next level and making it a true CRM solution.



Chen: What are some features of Prophet?

Wong: When you use Prophet, unlike our competitors Act and Goldmine, you only have to deal with one contact database, the one that is already in your Outlook. Prophet also allows you to view all of the e-mails, meetings and calendar information, and the to-do list, all on one screen and one click of a mouse. Essentially, what we have been able to do is make Outlook into a relational-contact management software by adding an extensive sales pipeline and detail notes functionality into Outlook.

If you understand how to use Outlook, you'll know how to use Prophet. Prophet can keep track of sales by type, stage, priority and source. You can run sales reports for the next 30, 60, 90 days, show all deals in the contract stage, initial meeting stage, etcetera. You can't do any of this in Outlook right now. We also created relationships between contacts. How many times have you had multiple contacts that work for one company and thought, now why can't I have a company view? Prophet does that.



Chen: Who would benefit most from Prophet?

Wong: Prophet is developed for professionals who interact with clients and are interested in better managing those relationships. If you've ever wanted to keep detailed notes from your dealings with any of the contacts in your Outlook and want to manage your pipeline, then Prophet might be a fit. Prophet was also designed for anyone who wants more from Outlook.



Chen: What was your first business?

Wong: My father and I built a successful taxi business that he still runs today. Essentially, we owned and operated a taxi fleet while I attended college. It's a small business, but it was a great experience in starting and running a business.



Chen: And Foci was your second business?

Wong: I call it a fairly successful company that took care of its clients and made a little money in return. However, like many other high-tech companies, we got caught up with the dot-com hype. So instead of being content with growing our core business, which was consulting and custom development, we went for the brass ring and spent a lot of our own money trying to morph ourselves into a product company.

We did electronic business and custom development, we had expertise with certain industries and we wanted to create a platform to help accelerate brick-and-mortar companies to e-business. Unfortunately, we were focused on building a management team and doing a lot of funding stuff, and not keeping our eyes on our core business. Fortunately, we had good people that kept the company moving forward while the owners were focused on building the next business.

Then Meritage approached us and we started the acquisition discussions. And the rest is history.

One of the lessons I learned is: Be content with your successes. If you are itching to do something else, research it first. Talk to people who are in that industry or have those experiences. You'll find that successful people are usually quite happy to point you in the right directions. I have numerous people I go to for advice on how to run my business. If you have the time or make the time, join organizations. You'll be pleasantly surprised by what you learn and the people you meet.

Life is too short; live your dreams. Sitting 30 years in a large cubicle is no way to live. Why not take the risk? We live in America, for God's sake. You'll never go hungry.

When building a business, the core fundamentals will always be true: Get the right people on the bus, know where you want to go and where you don't want to go, watch your costs and make sure you're adding real value that people are willing to pay for. Don't do something just for the money.

If you do all of the above things, financial success will be sure to follow.

For more information about Avidian, visit www.avidian.com.

Dennis Chen can be reached at scpnwan@nwlink.com.