Aftershock entrepreneur: "Why run one store when you can run 500?"

When Hiro Harjani stepped off the plane from India, he had no contacts, no cash and zero business experience. So how on earth did he build a fashion brand with 5,000 international trade accounts and celebrity endorsements from Lisa Snowden and Helen Mirren?

How to Be a Top Project Manager

The best project managers are those who consistently deliver, on time and within budget, projects that meet or exceed stakeholders' expectations. Those project managers understand that leadership and people skills are even more important to good project management than a sound methodologyand project tracking tools, says Fumi Kondo, managing director of Intellilink, a management consulting and training company that specializes in technology implementations.

Social networking startup goes self-service

Social-networking site provider Socialcast announced a "self-service" pricing model on Tuesday that allows smaller customers to get up and running without the need for a formal sales process.

"Our [sales] pipeline is filled with smaller organizations," said CEO Tim Young. "We thought you'd have to have at least 400, 500 employees to have the gravitational pull for [a social network] but we found there is benefit even for small teams."

Smaller companies also face deployment challenges, given their general lack of on-site IT staff and money for outsourcing, Young added.

Beginning Monday, customers with fewer than 1,000 users can sign up for Socialcast's hosted service on a month-to-month basis for US$5 per user per month, using a credit card.

Peeking Inside Cloud Computing

Cloud computing may be the latest in a barrage of techno buzzwords, but it's already in widespread use across corporate enterprises and by many consumers. Even more surprising: Most people who use cloud computing don't realize it.

Just how big will this phenomenon actually become, and is it really new? More to the point, why should chief information officers care? To help answer those questions, Forbes.com caught up with Peter Bell, general partner at Highland Capital Partners and the former chief executive of StorageNetworks.

Forbes.com: How new is the concept of cloud computing?

Youth not a barrier for entrepreneur

By JONA ISON • Gazette Staff Writer

Brooke Ashley Boydston doesn't let her young age keep her from pursuing her goals and dreams.  At 24, Boydston has started her own event planning and catering business, The Ashley House, in the Old Canal House on Ohio 104. Since opening in June, she has hosted a wine tasting and, most recently, a Labor Day celebration that attracted many patrons of the Easyriders Rodeo.

"This is a passion of mine. I passed this house all the time and could see so many possibilities," Boydston said.

Boydston, a Chillicothe High School alum, came back to Chillicothe after finishing school at Antonelli College, an institution of visual arts education in Cincinnati, where she studied wedding planning, interior design and event coordinating.

Replica sports-car business keeps entrepreneur in the race

By Paula Schleis / Beacon Journal business writer
POSTED: 04:56 p.m. EDT, Aug 29, 2008

Hans Leitner didn't know a whole lot about race cars. But he knew a good business opportunity when he saw it.

When he learned that a Medina County company was looking to get out of the replica sports car business, some quick research indicated it was abandoning a market with great growth potential.

So Leitner bought the company's molds for replicas of a pair of ultra-rare race cars — the Grand Sport and the Grand Touring Prototype — and launched a new enterprise: Mongoose Motorsports.