Teen entrepreneurs win IT Challenge
Software developed by St. Paul high school students won top
honors at the second annual "Making the Business: Youth IT Challenge."
The winning program was Academic Par Excellence, a business plan
for online tutorial programs for ACT and PSAT test preparation for
high-school students,
The Youth IT Challenge (YITC) program is a
technology-based business plan competition, which began in January
throughout the U.S. and hosted more than 150 students vying to compete
in the national event by winning locally sponsored Youth IT Challenges
in their home communities.
Each student received an HP laptop; a
printer; software including Microsoft Office 2003, Digital Image Suite
10 and Plus! SuperPack for Windows XP; a notebook optical mouse; and a
$719 U.S. Savings Bond.
MQSoftware buys Reconda
St.
Louis Park-based software company MQSoftware Inc. acquired Reconda
International Corp. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
MQSoftware makes middleware management programs, which act as
liaisons between large computers and from different manufacturers,
letting them exchange data more easily. Reconda, based in Greenwich,
Conn., makes middleware support products.
KCA to handle market
surveys
Minneapolis-based KC Associates was selected by
national IT market analyst firm IDC to conduct broad, in-depth market
surveys. To date, KCA has provided the survey data for two studies: a
national study aimed at improving commercial software needed to help key
U.S. industries remain competitive, and a global study on the
high-performance computing requirements of major industries.
KCA
says it is the only marketing consulting and communications organization
in Minnesota focused exclusively on business-to-business information
technology (IT) products and services.
Bankers Systems teams
with MeridianLink
St. Cloud-based Bankers Systems Inc. and
MeridianLink Inc. formed a strategic alliance for MeridianLink to offer
Bankers Systems' technology to its clients.
MeridianLink will
offer Banker Systems' LoanPQ electronic documents for lending
transactions to credit union clients that use its loan origination
system.
Bankers Systems is a subsidiary of Wolters Kluwer in
Amsterdam. The company provides compliance, credit and operational risk
management technology to financial organizations.
MeridianLink,
based in Costa Mesa, Calif., provides enterprise business technology to
credit unions and business partners.
OnePAL.com launches
shopping site
Minneapolis-based online company OnePAL LLC
launched its comparison shopping search engine, www.OnePAL.com. With
over 150,000 participating merchants, OnePAL.com offers consumers the
ability to search and compare over 900,000 products, including the most
popular MP3 players, digital cameras, camcorders and plasma TVs.
Shoppers use convenient links to compare features, prices and other
information before clicking through to a merchant's Web site to make a
purchase.
Ontrack releases reports program
Minneapolis-based Ontrack Data Recovery recently released Ontrack
VeriFile Online Data Reports.
VeriFile establishes a new standard
for pre-service evaluations by allowing customers to view a complete
listing of their recoverable and non-recoverable files in an organized,
easily searchable format. By means of a small browser-based application,
the new VeriFile reports offer customers the ability to make a more
informed decision about their data recovery.
IBS partners with
Internet coupon company
Mendota Heights-based Internet
Broadcasting Systems Inc. is partnering with a California company to
provide coupons to consumers via television news station Web sites.
IBS, which produces Web sites for TV news stations, is partnering
with Coupons Inc. to put coupons, offers and promotional incentives
online.
IBS, whose broadcast partners include NBC, Cox and
Post-Newsweek, said its sites are visited by more than 12 million unique
visitors a month.
Mountain View, Calif.-based Coupons Inc.
provides secure, print-from-the-Web coupons. The company's clients
include Johnson & Johnson, General Mills and Pfizer.
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