UPDATE

Founded in 1994, SOV Interactive Media is a local Monterey Bay new media design studio, that helps clients open their mind to innovative and customized media experiences in web, animation, interactive video, and sound.



Steve Voisin, Creative Director and Founder of SOV Interactive Media, is a San Francisco native and pioneer in online multimedia development, design, and theory. After Graduating from San Francisco State University with a B.A.in Communications and special emphasis in speech and alternative communication, Mr. Voisin graduated from one of the country's top multimedia design studies program through San Francisco State University.

In 1998, he brought his industry experience to Santa Cruz County. As a multimedia design collective of individual experts, the company is available to help companies of all sizes, deliver your corporate message electronically (and globally) in many ways:

• Corporate web site design and development
• Broadband video/audio streaming and production
• DVD and CDRom applications production
• Motion and graphic design
• Interactive multimedia demos
• Online marketing and tradeshow event promotions

Specializing in not only broadband web video, the company takes narrow band quite seriously and also focuses on creating maximum experiences on a minimalist dialup connection. SOV Interactive Media crosses different technologies such as Macromedia Flash, Director, RealMedia, Quicktime, and WindowsMedia inside web interfaces and provide cutting edge custom design solutions for their clients. The company expands not only within the web, but also exports their projects out to CD-ROMs, and DVD in order to meet their clients' needs. Their clients come from various industries such as Internet technology and Web firms, Entertainment companies, Design studios, Micro chip and Fiber Optics labs, Bio Techies, and even the wine cellar industry!

SOV interactive currently continues to grow with highly creative staff, including contractors and virtual employees within the SOV Networks, who can collectively scale up and down in size depending on projects and client budgets.

The company offers big agency quality, but is much more competitively priced and easy to work with as a lean group of creatives who are able to get your projects done on time.

Within the last few years, SOV Interactive has been working on various video, web, and interactive projects with: Seagate, AOL Time Warner, CNET Networks.

Steve Voisin's emphasis in interactive video led him from creating CD-ROM based video applications, to moving into the online web space in mid 1995. After several contracts in the CD-ROM and tradeshow, print publishing world including working for Ziff Davis, he worked with CNET Networks on several INTEL funded, streaming video, and interactive media projects with clients such as Sony, Newline Cinema, Warner Brothers, as well as on new media design projects internally for SNAP NBC. Steve has also traveled across the country several times to help produce on location live webcasts at tradeshows and events.

SOV Interactive Media has evolved into an independent and full service, new media design studio, that continues to help clients reach their goals on a global level.SOV is currently travelling globally for his clients, and is looking to MBITA as a partner in international business development.

Contact:

SOV Interactive Media
Steve Voisin, Creative Director
Felton, CA 95018
Tel: 831-251-7684
Fax: 831-335-8157
Web: www.sovinteractive.com
Email: steve@sovinteractive.com

MBITA Works in Partnership with the Global Technology Network!

Going global without betting the farm

How cost-effective? Although prices are coming down and features going up, a business these days can easily spend up to a $1 million for a higher-end transactional Web site. In contrast, the BuyUSA.com basic annual membership is $300 and allows a U.S. company to search for new international business contacts, trade leads, and market research. Then, cost depends on the type of service. With the BuyUSA Enhanced Catalog, for example, a small company can put their paper catalog online to increase visibility of its products for a fraction of the normal cost. In its short online life, the return on investment for the BuyUSA subscription is already high. Two small exporters report large contracts with international distributors as a direct result of their BuyUSA.com subscription.

New Jersey exporter Rocky Hadzovic found and verified a new distributor for his line of "Hollywood USA" high-quality body sprays, creams, baby products, deodorants, and shampoo using BuyUSA.com. And his success came in a market that many find challenging - Nigeria. The only way, Hadzovic says, to succeed in certain markets is "to find the right guy". "Having the American embassy check out a buyer out is the best way," he says. "If they say he's okay, I can trust him." With help in Newark, Lagos and on BuyUSA.com, Hadzovic sold $28,600 worth of product to a new distributor with a $60,000 follow-on order. He's signed a contract with the distributor and expects more success.

On the left coast, California exporter Thorp Minister also found export success on BuyUSA.com. Within days of subscribing, Minister found a new distributor in Hong Kong and shipped $13,000 of sports beverages. With this new contract, he expects to handle additional shipments totaling $40,000 per month. Minister points out that with luck, a half million dollars in yearly revenue could result from only days of exposure on BuyUSA. "It's a really good platform to promote U.S. goods," says Minister. Plus, as he explains, "It has a great name"--so international buyers in search of U.S. products know exactly where to look.

Another appeal of BuyUSA.com for businesspeople that have signed up for the service is that it comes as close as they've seen to a true one-stop shop. Elizabeth Austin, business development and marketing manager for Scandinavian Naturals, says the service seems "to bring together more pieces of the puzzle-buyers, sellers and trade opportunities."

Scandinavian Naturals, a manufacturer of nutritional supplements, skin care and other products for the natural healthcare market, currently exports to 30 countries. "There are a million different places to go" to look for distributors and agents, said Austin, "so simplifying my job and facilitating my exposure to foreign distributors and agents is very important."

For Stewart Dahlberg of J.D, Streett & Company, a manufacturer of industrial lubricants in St. Louis, the main benefit of BuyUSA.com is speed. "This was the fastest export sale we ever made," said Mr. Dahlberg, who marvels over how quickly the deal completed with a buyer in Vietnam. On the Vietnamese side, buyers there are delighted with this new source of suppliers who often offer lower prices than their traditional suppliers in Asia and Europe. The advantages of e-marketplaces heralded in the infancy of the Internet - value, greater velocity and efficiency - seem to be a reality for BuyUSA.com members.

The Commercial Service spends a great deal of effort identifying qualified buyers in the markets where it has offices and knows the lay of the land. In the crazy quilt world of languages and business practices, knowing who pays the bills on time and enjoys a good reputation for delivering the goods is invaluable-for buyers and sellers.

The trust factor was a particularly strong selling point for BuyUSA.com subscriber Robert Coglia, president of Lactona Corporation, a Pennsylvania-based manufacturer or oral hygiene products. "Frankly, I'm afraid when I get contacted out of the blue by a potential overseas customer," he said, "I need to expand by customer base, but I need to know who I'm dealing with."

When asked about seeking help from the U.S. government, Coglia said he has absolutely no qualms. "Working with the Department of Commerce gives me confidence. It gives me a good feeling, and I know other small businesspeople who have never exported before but are ready to sign up for the same reason."

Point, click, and samba

Foreign buyers often mirror the concerns of U.S. businesses. Here's how BuyUSA.com works from the foreign buyer side. Say a Brazilian natural healthcare products distributor or retailer is looking for new products from the U.S. The Brazilian firm, whose bona fides have been checked by the Commercial Service, can post a lead on the site. U.S. suppliers such as Scandinavian Naturals (which now doesn't have to worry about speaking fractured Swedish) can contact the Brazilian directly online. If the Brazilian is unsure about the U.S. supplier, they can contact their local U.S. Commercial Service (located in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia, and Belo Horizonte) office to get more information about the supplier. These offices also provide access to local Commercial Service experts, business and industry information on all 50 states, assistance scheduling meetings with U.S. suppliers either face-to-face or via videoconference, online discussion forums, and a calendar of U.S. trade events.

But buyers can come from any country that has access to the Internet, and as business owners like Lactona's Robert Coglia knows, it doesn't take many to make a big difference to the bottomline. "I know there will be distributors throughout the world interested in our products," he said, "we need help finding them and completing the sale."

Replies the Commercial Service's Maria Cino, "We want BuyUSA.com to be a marketplace that saves both buyers and sellers time, money and worry. Our primary function is creating perfect matches. We've done it successfully for 20 years around the world, and now we're doing it online."

The U.S. Commercial Service of the Department of Commerce and the U.S. Pan Asian American Chamber of Commerce have partnered together to provide small and midsized businesses global business solutions. Let the U.S. Department of Commerce help your business grow.

Visit www.BuyUSA.com today and see your sales grow tomorrow.Please enter the MBITA subscriber code 502 when prompted during registration.

See BuyUSA for Yourself:
Visit the BuyUSA site
View our affordable membership fees
Join BuyUSA today!

For a live site demonstration, please contact the Monterey Bay International Trade Association at 831-469-0148 or email at info@mbita.org, or call the BuyUSA customer service team at 1(866) 855-8666.

Please go to MBITA web site and CLICK on BuyUSA icon or go to: http://www.mbita.org/buyusa.php3. Please enter the MBITA subscriber code 502 when prompted during online registration on MBITA's website. The Monterey Bay International Trade Association is an Affiliate Partner of BuyUSA.

MBITA Santa Cruz Luncheon Trade and Investment opportunities in the Pan-European Marketplace

On February 21st, 2002 long-time supporter and friend of MBITA's, Michael Likala, now the Senior Commercial Officer of the U.S. Dept. of Commerce Commercial Service in Spain, was a guest speaker at the Santa Cruz chapter luncheon meeting.Mike, a former graduate of UCSC, spoke about the great opportunuties that exist in Spain for smaller businesses to export to Spain in the high-technology, telecommunications, bio-tech and environmental technology industries.

"With all of our Spanish-speaking people in California, we sometimes forget about Spain as a great place to market our goods and services", stated Mr. Likala. Mr. Likala commented that his days in Santa Cruz as a student at UCSC were very poignant in his life, and helped develop his deep thinking process throughout his life.

A Way With Words (AWWW)

MBITA corporate sponsor A Way With Words (AWWW)/Tacitus Group offers a range of outsourced marketing services that help build value for your enterprise. From global strategy definition to corporate brand development to integrated public relations and advertising, AWWW can give your business the marketing expertise to thrive and succeed in the local and international marketplace. Visit our web site at www.awaywwords.com or contact Elizabeth Bourget at (831) 430 - 9719.

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