Jaakko Pöyry Group and Elisa Communications have established a joint venture company named Inforbis Oy. The new company offers sector-specific web-based service concepts, which incorporate tools for storing, distributing, processing and managing information. Inforbis aims to achieve net sales of about FIM 20 million in Finland by 2003. The company is planning to expand its operations to the other Nordic countries and Europe.
According to the service concept developed by Inforbis, the client will get access to rented tools and applications over the Internet, supported by the owner companies' strong know-how in the forest industry, infrastructure and environment, energy and telecommunications sectors. With the launch of the new service, Inforbis establishes itself as a Business Service Provider (BSP). As a BSP company, Inforbis adds ASP (Application Service Provider) activities to business sector expertise in order to provide a flexible business solution transcending organisation borders.
The new service concept is primarily intended to serve multilateral project work, meeting the operating and maintenance needs of the completed plant during its entire lifecycle. The new service will help the client streamline communications in large projects, improve its information management and save a lot of time and money to improve its profitability. Initially, the service concept will include applications for document management, web-based camera surveillance and web-based communication, but the range of tools will be expanded. The application platform of the new service concept relies on technology developed by Lotus.
Jaakko Pöyry Group Oyj holds 70 per cent of the shares in Inforbis Oy, Elisa Communications 30 per cent.
"The Jaakko Pöyry Group is a pioneer in e-business within its own business sectors, and has served as a link between the old and new economy during the past years. We have had access to fully operational, tested products for e-business for a long time. We have high hopes for Inforbis, because the growth prospects for the BSP business are promising", comments Teuvo Salminen, Executive Vice President of Jaakko Pöyry Group Oyj.
"Elisa Communications decided to enter the joint venture, because we specialise in Internet applications and because we foresee major business potential in this sector. In addition, were are in the frontline when it comes to developing business solutions related to communications, data transfer and information management", summarises Matti Carpén, Executive Vice President, Elisa Communications.
Growth prospects are good for Inforbis Oy's services.
"According to Gartner Group, the world market for groupware is more than USD 3 billion, and it is still showing double-digit growth. We are well placed, because clients are looking for new solutions for multilateral projects, and our competitors do not have the same kind of BSP concept available", says Kalevi Keto, President of Inforbis Oy.
JAAKKO PÖYRY GROUP OYJ
Erkki Pehu-Lehtonen
Teuvo Salminen