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There is no chance you have missed the fact thatthe world is in a recession. There is a lot of discussionin the media about who is doing okay, who ishurting and what strategies companies might beemploying to survive.

So I thought I would take this opportunity to let you know

about some of the things that have been changing at

Intergen lately. Many of the changes have been

planned for some time but certainly there is a

feeling that we need to increase the intensity of

our evolution. We are always striving to do things

better and now it is even more important than ever.

We have made some changes to the way we organise ourselves. These

changes continue on from the strategy work we undertook at the beginning of

last year and are designed to improve the way we do business.

We have moved to become more sales focused and to revitalise our sales culture.

We have introduced a new role of General Manager, Sales, and Bruce Smith has

been appointed to that role.

Wayne Forgesson, previously responsible for both Sales and Marketing as Director,

Business Development, takes on a new role of Director, Marketing. Wayne is

charged with ensuring our sales team has the best possible environment in

which to engage with our customers. One of the first initiatives from Wayne’s

team is the new Rapid Results suite of products. These are product and service

offerings that allow clients to engage with us to receive a predetermined solution

that provides value for a fixed price (see page 3 for more information).

We have also changed our project delivery teams. We now have four practices:

Enterprise Applications, Portals Content and Collaboration,

Microsoft Dynamics Solutions and Management Consulting.

These practices focus on solutions rather than

disciplines, which allows us to be more focused

on efficient delivery of solutions and repeatability

of results, in turn reducing risk and increasing value.

Our strong local focus remains, with each of our offices

having its own practice leadership, but we have also improved

communications and consistency nationally with the introduction

of national practice principals for each practice area.

We understand that in these tough times your budgets are being squeezed.

We are working hard to make sure we are well placed to offer you solutions that

continue to deliver you real business value. The people you have been dealing

with will not change but the organisation behind them will be sharper and have

a clear focus on delivering high quality, cost effective and innovative solutions.

tony.stewart@intergen.co.nz

ACCESSIBILITY &SILVERLIGHT

Check out our free upcoming events – registernow at www.intergen.co.nz/events

Cloud ComputingA guide to the various online platforms andwhat cloud computing could mean for yourbusiness.

Rapid Results Roadshows– CRM and SharePointCustomer and information management withbigger bang, fewer bucks, faster results.Including events in Hamilton.

New TechnologiesCheck out what’s on the horizon with the latest– and future – Microsoft technologies and learnwhat these innovations can do for you.

Intergen holds regular, free informationalseminars. Sign up to go on our invitationlist, or check our site regularly for updates.

< Copyright 2009 Intergen Limited. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the permission of Intergen Limited >

The pictures say it all, really. We’re a quarter of theway through 2009, and we’ve had a few yellowtriumphs so far, as you might expect. You can readall about our Microsoft exploits and ventures inNew Zealand and around the globe on the followingpages. It’s hard to keep track of them all at themoment, but here’s the latest, for now at least.

This year Intergen is excited to be a strategic partner of Microsoft’s Imagine Cup, “the

world’s premiere student software design competition.” Graduate recruitment has

always been really important to us, and fostering young IT talent is a big part of our

driving force – so Imagine Cup is a great way for us to get involved and spot new

talent. And it just so happens we’re fortunate to have one of last year’s Imagine Cup

New Zealand winners, Yugan Yugaraja, on staff.

And our esteemed Managing Director, Tony

Stewart, and Auckland developer Hamish Hill

are also on the judging panel.

Every year in the dragonboating season the Wellington Harbour is ablaze with

yellow and this year was no exception. Once again, the Intergen Raptors outdid

themselves, coming third overall in the B finals in the New Zealand Dragon Boat

Nationals in Rotorua this year, beating even NZ Army, who pipped them at the post

in the regional finals.

The surf was up at Webstock this year, with Intergen putting on a surf shack complete

with smoothies and a ride-on surfboard which provided much amusement (and

prizes) for the punters. It’s great for us to get involved in the interactive web space,

and Webstock is an event much anticipated each year by our interactive designers.

This year we were fortunate enough to sponsor online community gurus, Heather

Champ (of Flickr fame) and Derek Powazek. We even had them along to chat to

our staff – which could have gone on for hours if there wasn’t work to be done!

Watch this space for the next Intergen photo gallery.

Intergen’s Yellow Raptors battle their way to third place in the National Dragon Boating B Finals.

Intergen hangs 10 at Webstock.

>> INTERGENITE:

Bruce SmithWhat do you do?I am General Manager National Sales(before that I was a Wellington BusinessDevelopment Manager with Intergensince 2004). I’m responsible for revenuegeneration and developing Intergen’ssales culture.

How do you make a difference?My main goal in life is to make sure we’reestablishing value for our clients and doingeverything we can to become their partnerof preference. Internally, I’m here to coach,mentor and encourage high performance.

What do you love about your job?Everything! You could say I have sales inmy blood... I’m really passionate aboutIntergen and everything Intergen standsfor and will do anything I can to make ussecond to none in the industry.

A bit about yourself...I was born in Christchurch, the middlechild with an older brother and youngersister. I’ve been in professional sales allmy working life (25 years and counting).I live on a lifestyle block half an hour outof Wellington and indulge in a bit ofweekend farming. I have two lovelydaughters, aged six and nine, and in myspare time enjoy a spot of skiing, football,hunting and shooting.

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Raptorous

Give your systemsa check-up

Take advantage of new opportunities –faster than before

>>3>> N E W P A C K A G E S < S M A R T S - T H E I N T E L L I G E N T B U S I N E S S M A G A Z I N E . I S S U E N I N E T E E N >

Despite the media’s negative preoccupationwith the economy, tough times can also createopportunities. As the needs of our customers,partners and competitors evolve, opportunitiesto create new relationships will inevitably arise,and the smart organisations are those thatare ready to take advantage of them.

Intergen has created a set of packaged consulting offerings to help

organisations capitalise on opportunities in the marketplace. Introduced

in the last issue of SMARTS, our Rapid Results offerings are now available,

delivering a fixed cost service that gets organisations up and running

quickly in a variety of solutions.

Our philosophy behind Rapid Results? We believe customers want

predictability – of outcome and of cost – while not sacrificing future

opportunities for growth. Rapid Results allows us to provide a core set of

functionality across a number of offerings, and while we have standardised

these as much as possible, they all give our customers a foundation upon

which further customisation can be added in the future.

Intergen’s Rapid Results for CRM delivers a core set of sales and marketing

capabilities that utilise Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Primarily targeted at

smaller companies – those with five to15

employees – this offering is also ideal for

larger organisations wanting to implement

CRM within a department, or wanting a solid

foundation for a proof of concept project. We

work with you to quickly get the project up

and running, using software installed on-

premise or in the cloud, and work with you to

configure it to meet your needs.

A similar approach is used for our other initial

offering, Rapid Results for SharePoint. This

package is designed for organisations utilising

Microsoft SharePoint as the basis of an

intranet solution. Once again, we work with

you to configure a SharePoint solution across

a number of key functional areas, giving you

a solution that can be rolled out to your users.

Want to move quickly to get an edge on your

competitors? Talk to an Intergen salesperson

now, or go to www.intergen.co.nz/rapidresults.

The medical industry has long recommended thatwe all get regular check-ups.

Our IT systems are no different– we regularly need to see howthey perform with newtechnologies, or how well theywork as the needs of our organisations evolve. Sometimes we may know what’s wrong,through poor performance or glitches in appearance. At other times, we may be tryingto determine the impact of new technology, without yet having access to it.

At Intergen we are cognisant of these challenges, and of an increasing desire bymany organisations to get more out of their existing investments.

Bundled together under the HealthCheck brand, these offerings provide a low cost,quick review, and a series of recommendations, if required, as to how any issuescould be addressed. Currently we have two HealthCheck offerings available.

Our Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 HealthCheck is designed to help organisationsunderstand how the latest version of Microsoft’s web browser will render pages ontheir website or in their applications. Priced at only $750, an Intergen consultantwill test nominated pages or templates on your site, and then provide a reportdetailing findings – using the most recently available version of IE8, and comparingit to how IE7 renders the site. This is ideal for anyone who has invested in a website,and who’s not aware of the issues that IE8 could expose.

The second initiative is our CRM HealthCheck, designed for existing Microsoft DynamicsCRM implementations. Working to a fixed cost and timeframe, we will come in andanalyse your system across a range of areas and provide a report of findings, withina two day period. This is ideal for any organisation that has implemented CRM andis either finding it’s not being adopted widely, or has certain technical issues.

Both these solutions are designed to help your organisation get more out of itsexisting technology investments. Over the next few months we’ll be introducing moreof these. For more information, go to www.intergen.co.nz/healthchecks.

Chris Auld is Intergen’s Directorof Strategy and Innovation.

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then I encourage you to watch the video of my session at

http:/sessions.visitmix.com/MIX09/C20F to learn just how easy it is to get a

great looking SharePoint site. Our Intergen designers have been hard at work

designing a set of ten SharePoint themes for Microsoft, now openly available to

SharePoint designers and developers worldwide (see opposite page).

I also used this session to announce a new version of a key development tool

for SharePoint (see opposite page).

If you’d like to discuss how Silverlight can boost the accessibility of your website,

please contact Intergen’s Lead Solution Architect, Andrew Tokeley

andrewt@intergen.co.nz. If you’d like some help theming your SharePoint site

then please get in touch with Portals, Content and Collaboration Practice

Principal, Mark Orange marko@intergen.co.nz.

“ButtercupReader shows us a future where web applications can rival the interactivity

and usability of desktop applications and still be accessible to a wide audience.”

Andrew Tokeley, Lead Solution Architect and Buttercup Team Lead.

Working with MicrosoftAt Intergen we’re unashamedly ‘mad about Microsoft.’ They’re our biggest business

partner and we work with Microsoft people both here in New Zealand and around

the globe each and every day to deliver fantastic solutions to our clients. Microsoft

is also one of our largest customers – it’s really an extension of the whole concept

of partnership: working together for mutual benefit.

We’re proud of the breadth of our Microsoft practice at Intergen and that breadth really

shines through in the work we do with Microsoft themselves. We obviously can’t talk

I started writing this at 30,000 feet, somewhere out over the Pacific Ocean onmy way back from the fourth Microsoft MIX Conference.

MIX09This event is held yearly in Las Vegas, the

city synonymous with conspicuous

consumption, although it’s fair to say the

city has been humbled by recent economic

events around the world. For the second year

running, Intergen spent the past few months

building up a great sample application to

launch at MIX. Last year it was TextGlow, our

Word document renderer for Silverlight. This

year we announced ButtercupReader, a fully

featured talking book reader for people with

visual disabilities. We’ve written Buttercup

using Microsoft Silverlight as a showcase of

how to do truly accessible applications on

the web. We officially launched Buttercup

during a breakout session at MIX09 (see

page 6 for more information).

I also presented a one-hour session this year

on building SharePoint themes.

If you’re still using one of the out-of-the-box

SharePoint themes on your intranet or extranet,

What we’ve beendoing with Microsoft

about all the work we do publicly – for many of our projects strict ‘Chinese walls’ limit

awareness even within Intergen. But, we’ve put together a sample of some of the things

we’ve done over the past few months to give you an idea of what we’ve been up to.

Training the WorldThe Intergen team has been travelling the world training other partners in Microsoft

technologies. The focus for the first few months of 2009 has been the new Azure

Services platform and the more established Dynamics CRM platform. In both cases

Intergen has been delivering events from Bangalore to Beijing and every latitude

in between. We’ve delivered content not only in English

but also Mandarin Chinese.

“It’s a fascinating opportunity and experience to travel

to my home country and share our expertise of the Dynamics

CRM platform with my fellow country men and women.”

Jian Sun Dynamics CRM Developer and Trainer.

Be sure to come along to my upcoming Twilight session

on Cloud Computing Platforms and Mark Orange’s session

covering the latest Microsoft Technologies. See

www.intergen.co.nz/twilights.

Conjuring CRM ContentFor the past few months our Dynamics Practice has been working

hard on a new two-day training course on Dynamics CRM. Designed

to showcase the power of Dynamics CRM as an application development

platform, this intensive two-day course, including presentations and labs,

is presented in cities around the world from April to June.

“At Intergen we’re keen proponents of XRM, the idea that CRM can be used

to build Line of Business applications. The course we’ve developed is really an

embodiment of that vision.” Rex Wessels, CRM Developer and Project Lead.

The 10 SharePoint themes designed by Intergen. If you would liketo download these or learn more, contact marko@intergen.co.nz.

>>5>> I N T E R G E N & M I C R O S O F T < S M A R T S - T H E I N T E L L I G E N T B U S I N E S S M A G A Z I N E . I S S U E N I N E T E E N >

Inspiring CommunityFaced with a difficult challenge or an unknown problem, most developers will

turn to the web for answers. Often answers can be found in online community

sites but what is the catalyst that helps drive those sites? Over the

past few months, Intergen has been working to build and support

the community of expertise around the Office Open XML file

formats. This has involved not only building out interesting

content and samples that demonstrate the use of the

technology but also dealing with the softer side of

managing a community of thousands of developers from

around the world.

“I’m excited about taking what we’ve learnt from running the Office

Open XML communities and sharing it with our customers around

the country who are looking to run their own community sites.”

Jennifer Wray, Consultant, Management Consulting Practice

and site Community Manager.

For developers building applications for Microsoft SharePoint, a tool

called the Visual Studio Extensions for Windows SharePoint Services

(VSeWSS) is an invaluable aid. Late last year we began working with

Microsoft to build a new version of this tool, incorporating feedback

from developers around the world. While the final release will not be

available for another month or so, the Community Technical Preview has

been released.

“It’s pretty exciting to work on building a tool that you know will be

used by thousands of your fellow developers around the world.” Clive

Vermeulen, VSeWSS v1.3 Lead Developer.

chrisa@intergen.co.nz

Accessibility is a pretty hot topic in the world ofwebsite creation, and ButtercupReader, developedby Intergen for Microsoft, is a living example of theway in which innovative technologies can enablebreakthroughs and remove barriers.

ButtercupReader is a Silverlight application that allows visually impaired people to

read DAISY (digital accessible information system) “talking books” and better access

the information contained within Word documents. No special hardware required, and

no cost to the user. The only thing needed is Microsoft Silverlight, which is free and

just takes a few minutes to download. There are a number of readers on the market,

but none so accessible or easy to obtain. All you need to do is open your browser.

Intergen was commissioned by Microsoft to develop the reader, based on our extensive

experience developing TextGlow. Intergen enlisted the expertise of the Royal New

Zealand Foundation of the Blind to provide valuable consultancy on the project.

Kevin Prince, the Foundation’s Adaptive Technology Services Manager, comments,

“Buttercup’s design is exciting and intuitive to use. Intergen has done really clever

things with all the interactive design interfaces and the result is a really sharp, well-

designed experience. The key to it all is that it’s absolutely accessible – it can be there,

ready to go on a web browser, with no special applications or expense required."

ButtercupReader is proof that rich internet applications such as Silverlight can

truly deliver a compelling and engaging experience within a web browser, rich

in interactivity, usability and simple to run. Some of ButtercupReader’s innovations

include the concept of self-voicing (in Internet Explorer), touch screen actions,

keyboard shortcut keys, word search, resizing and contrast capabilities. Silverlight’s

rich visual elements make for seamless “zoomability.”

Making accessibility areality: introducingButtercupReader

Tony Stewart presents a donation at Braille House to Leanne Thompson atRoyal New Zealand Foundation of the Blind.

Chris Auld says, “ButtercupReader shows that not only can we build an application

that is accessible, we can build an application whose sole purpose in life is to

be accessible – and that’s very much where the future is heading.”

Try the application yourself at http://www.buttercupreader.net

ButtercupReader in action.

>> INTERGENITE:

Naomi LindWhat do you do?I’m the Delivery Manager for the Northernregion. I’m responsible for ensuring qualityof project delivery for our clients with themost efficient use of our great team herein Auckland.

How do you make a difference?It’s really about optimising our people andprocesses. I work closely with the projectmanagers, practice leads and sales teamto gain a broad view of a customer’sbusiness and the project. This is critical inthe current climate as our projects aretightly linked to quicker ROI and alsoallows us to make sure the right peopleare on the project team.

What do you love about my job?It’s all about the people. We have a greatteam who are the best at what they do,and are focused on delivering the bestsolutions for our clients.

A bit about yourself...I was born in Matamata and grew up on adairy farm. Deciding against a dairy farmingcareer early in my life, I pursued a career inthe IT industry and I have spent most of myworking life in Auckland. Although Aucklandis the place I now call home, I am also aWaikato girl at heart. During my career I alsowent to the UK on my OE, where I operatedas a project director for software developmentcompanies in the United Kingdom.

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We take customer support seriously, and in linewith our strategy implementations and organisation-wide realignments, we’ve overhauled our incumbentsupport system, replacing it with Neocase, a leadingcustomer service solution based on MicrosoftDynamics CRM technology.

Our end goal at the end of many months of hard work is ultimately just one thing: to

serve you better. We want to give you the best support possible, and with our CRM and

Neocase systems honed and at the ready, we’re better positioned to do this than ever.

What’s different? If you’re familiar with our support team and systems, you won’t

notice any radical changes right off the bat. We’re hoping the only changes you

notice are good ones – greater responsiveness and timeliness, and – most of all –

faster resolutions to cases. You’ll still be dealing with the same Intergenites, people

who understand your business, but the transmission of information will be a lot

more effective with Neocase in place. There will be several ongoing improvements

over time too, such as a self service portal for customers.

Charged with managing the Neocase implementation, Intergen Service Desk

Manager, Brent Wimmers, says: “Neocase offers some great features and improvements

– increased security, improved SLA management, a client portal and enhanced email

management and tracking.”

As you’ll know, we’re committed to Microsoft technologies, and there is a

wealth of reputable third party providers out there who extend the Microsoft

offering, making your product even more effective and broad-reaching.

Intergen has forged strong relationships with a number of these providers

in recent years, and this allows us to extend our service offering to you

and make sure you’re getting the most out of your investment. Neocase

is just one example of the ways Microsoft products can be successfully

On the case with Neocase

extended, and we’re proud to be the first in

New Zealand to lead with an integration of

this type.

As Intergen is an established software

developer, you may be wondering why we

decided to purchase software rather than

write it ourselves. The answer to this is simple.

We wanted to offer first class, best of breed

customer service, and the best way for us to

do this was to look to the collective wisdom

of other contact centres globally. And the

stand-out choice was Neocase.

We look forward to supporting you, and

supporting you better. For any information on

Neocase or Intergen’s support offering, please

email brent.wimmers@intergen.co.nz .

David Roys co-authored ’Implementing MicrosoftDynamics 2009.‘ For further information, emaildavid.roys@intergen.co.nz

>> AUTHOR PROFILE

David RoysWhat do I do?I work in the Dynamics Solutions Practiceand am a developer and consultant forthe Microsoft Dynamics NAV product inthe Christchurch office.

How do I make a difference?I have worked with Enterprise ResourcePlanning (ERP) systems for many years asboth an application consultant anddeveloper. My application consultingexperience makes me a better developerbecause I understand how people use ERPand how they carry out their businessprocesses. My development knowledgemakes me a better consultant because Iunderstand the application at an extremelylow level and can always look at the sourcecode to figure things out. I am one of afew Microsoft Most Valued Professionals(MVP) for the Dynamics NAV product whichmeans I get to chat with the team atMicrosoft that build the product aboutupcoming features and I also getopportunities to see pre-release versions.

What do I love about my job?I love to solve problems. Working withbusinesses and their unique processesmeans there are always new challenges to

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be met. Programming in NAV’s applicationlanguage and using the built-indevelopment environment means I get allof the fun of programming without thehard work of making simple things happen(like making my data appear in a form).The new NAV 2009 architecture means Ialso get to play with .NET and Visual Studio.

A bit about myself...I have co-written a book entitled“Implementing Microsoft Dynamics NAV2009.” This was an incredible experienceand took up a lot of my free time in 2008.I made a great friend in my co-author,although I have never met or spoken tohim. All communication surrounding thebook was done through emails and a fewinstant messages. Writing a book has helpedme learn how to take criticism and to nottake my work too seriously. I try to spendsome of my free time helping people in theNAV community by answering forumquestions and blogging from myexperiences. I like to play music at homeand, between my kids telling me to stop,I play drums and classical guitar.

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FIND OUT MORE ABOUT INTERGEN:

Auckland: Wellington: Christchurch:Dunedin:Sydney: Perth:

info@intergen.co.nzwww.intergen.co.nz

www.intergen.com.au

Rick Rashid, head of MicrosoftResearch, recently commentedin the Financial Times thatabout 20 percent of all theserver computers being soldin the world “are now beingbought by a small handful ofinternet companies,” includingMicrosoft, Google, Yahoo andAmazon.

Reminiscent of the mainframe era of the past,

there is an increasing – and very active –

movement towards having applications and

infrastructure that resides remotely, accessed

across a network. This movement is being

driven by many of the current technology

leaders, particularly those mentioned above.

Welcome to the age of cloud computing. The

“cloud,” whether it’s talking about ‘cloud services’

or ‘cloud computing’, is the buzzword du jour,

usurping “Web 2.0” as one of the most over-

used terms in the technology industry, but is

an area where most of the larger technology

companies are committing to invest billions

of dollars over the next few years.

Getting ahead in the cloud

Despite its widespread use, the concept of the cloud conveys several meanings

depending on the vendors and technologies involved. Is it web hosting of your

application code? Is it a software platform as an on-demand service? Do Software

as a Service and Software + Services applications count as cloud computing?

The answer to all these questions are a qualified “yes” – the answer revolves

around the outsourcing of computing of any kind – storage, CPU, applications

– using a shared cost, commodity model.

Besides representing yet another bandwagon for technologists to talk and tweet

about, cloud computing is worthy of consideration for organisations of all sizes.

The opportunity to use shared, pre-installed and implemented infrastructure that

is available anywhere, at any time and is charged for on a pay-as-you-use basis

provides numerous benefits to organisations – large and small.

Microsoft and the Cloud

Microsoft is one of the many companies investing in the cloud, on many levels.

Windows Azure is Microsoft’s platform for building and deploying cloud-based

applications, delivering organisations on-demand computing and storage

capabilities, all of which are hosted in Microsoft’s data centres.

Don’t underestimate the importance of the cloud to Microsoft. Despite Google

becoming known for its hosted applications, and the widespread discussion

around the supposed impact they may have on Microsoft’s business, particularly

Office, Microsoft has placed significant investment in cloud services and is

embracing it right across the organisation.

Reportedly, all product groups within Microsoft have been instructed to ensure

cloud computing – utilising Windows Azure – features in their product roadmaps.

Many observers have compared this edict to the one made when Microsoft’s

product groups were instructed to incorporate the internet into their products,

at the time the internet was just emerging – an indication of how significant

the cloud, and Azure in particular, is in Microsoft’s future plans.

Intergen has been closely aligned with Microsoft and its Azure cloud computing platform

since it was originally announced. Confirmed by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer as being

released late 2009, Intergen’s Chris Auld, Director Strategy and Innovation, has been closely

involved in understanding how Azure works, and training Microsoft partners across the Asia

region – an indication of how Intergen’s experience in this area is being received.

In addition to Windows Azure, the notion of hosted applications has already been

embraced by Microsoft. Now available in New Zealand, Microsoft’s Online Services suite

of applications includes hosted versions of Microsoft Exchange, SharePoint, Office

Communications Server and Live Meeting.

These applications enable organisations to deploy market-leading solutions without the

need to purchase additional hardware or software – users connect to the applications

over the web, and can also utilise the power of Microsoft’s client software – such as

Microsoft Office – to take advantage of the services offline as well as online. It is

anticipated these applications will also make their way into Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure,

taking advantage of Azure, if they are not already. Office 14, the next release of Microsoft

Office, is purportedly going to be available in a hosted version, likely in a cut-down

form, utilising an underlying Azure platform.

While cloud applications won’t replace on-premise applications for many organisations,

they do represent a further shift in how technology is deployed, accessed and adopted.

To find out more, attend our upcoming Twilight seminar where Chris Auld will provide

an update on Azure and its capabilities and benefits; email events@intergen.co.nz or

go to www.intergen.co.nz/twilights for more information. Alternatively, contact

Intergen to arrange a briefing on these offerings if you would like to discuss how these

services can benefit your organisation.

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