Setting up a new small business in a hurry

I thought it might be interesting if this blog included periodic updates about iPerimeter as a business, from various different angles:

• Marketing, contacts, etc.
• Premises
• Technology
• Corporate/legal/commercial
• Chargeable activity
• Skills building

Progress so far in some of these areas:

Marketing, contacts, etc. - I've already posted about my website. I've also spent a lot of time building my LinkedIn profile (http://www.linkedin.com/in/mandyshaw) and LinkedIn network (currently 187 connections), and I've also been answering questions on LinkedIn, hopefully to get my name into the public eye. I intend to sign up as the basic level of IBM Business Partner (waiting on my VAT registration coming through), and am already discussing a couple of other vendor relationships.

Premises - Still working on this one.

Technology - I've talked about some of this. Here's a summary.

PC - Thinkpad T43 running:

• XP SP3
• MS Office 2003 Standard Edition
• ActiveSync and SOTI PCPro (for smartphone integration)
• Pidgin (for instant messaging)
• AVG 8.0 Internet Security
• SharpReader, Windows Media Player and Audacity (for podcasts and music)
• Sente SenLab02 (for label printing)
• PrimoPDF and SVGMaker (for output manipulation)
• Microsoft Photo Editor (for image manipulation)
• Apache Tomcat, Nvu, MySQL, Sun JDK 6, GnuWin32 SED, Ant, CoreFTP, ActivePerl and AWStats (all for website processing)
• Google Desktop

Smartphone - Samsung Omnia (T-Mobile, with unlimited internet connectivity)

ADSL - Zen (I have been a customer since 2002)

Domain iperimeter.co.uk with hosted web space and email - Zen

Instant messaging and social networks - MSN Messenger, AOL AIM, IBM external Sametime, LinkedIn, Facebook, Plaxo, Blogger

Wikis - PBwiki

Website design done by me. Website content entered via Nvu and Excel. Website generated using Tomcat, MySQL, Ant and assorted scripting techniques, and uploaded using CoreFTP

Corporate/legal/commercial - I have had to do the following so far: register iPerimeter Ltd as a limited company (I used companiesmadesimple.com); set up business bank account; obtain public liability insurance; register for corporation tax and VAT (I have signed up with a local accountant).