Egghead Forms New Subsidiary Elekom To Market Software To Cut Paperwork Expenses

Egghead Software has established a subsidiary company that will pioneer a secure, electronic procurement system to help companies reduce paperwork expenses.

Elekom Corp., which will begin marketing its new software package in January, was formed to develop and market electronic commerce applications and services linking customers and their suppliers through desktop computers.

“This product will certainly expedite business between Egghead and its customers,” said Kirk Lockhart, the newly-appointed president of Elekom, “but beyond that, we see many other suppliers coming onto the network.”

Lockhart explained that many suppliers have written their own software that allows their customers to order supplies via computer. But the problem was that each company then had to load a separate software package for each supplier with whom they dealt.

“Soon you’ve got so many systems going that the procurement people don’t have any idea what’s going on,” Lockhart said.

“What was needed was a common front end to a whole community of suppliers that would build more of a trading community.”

Elekom’s product, called EleTrade, is designed to do that. It is an electronic catalogue service built on a universal software system that customers and suppliers can use to link to a variety of targets.

The pathway that linkage follows is provided by AT&T Network Notes, a private computer network that operates like the Internet, except that it is not accessible by the public.

“You need a private network because often this is very confidential information you are moving back and forth,” Lockhart said.

Elekom is initially targeting its products and services to Fortune 1000 companies with complex purchasing environments. The range of services and products offered through the system include office supplies, furniture, computer hardware and software, and facilities management supplies.

“The EleTrade application will reduce the cost and effort of corporate procurement by decentralizing purchasing activity while centralizing corporate controls,” Lockhart said. “We believe that the early adopters of this technology will be the first to gain a competitive advantage in their markets.”

, DataTimes