PetroVision, Inc.
Westbrook, CT

Director, Software Development
Mid-1994 through late 1999

Reported to President

Responsibilities

• Develop, maintain and execute strategic plan for software development.

• Advise business management on feasibility and timelines for product development.

• Suggest new products.

• Advise on marketing strategies for existing and upcoming products.

• Seek out and integrate new technologies into products. Perform R&D on Internet / distributed technologies including CORBA, DCOM, Java.

• Respond to tactical concerns during development and integrate those concerns into the strategic plan.

• Manage the development process to ensure the most effective application of resources consonant with business goals.

• Create and maintain software development and human factors standards for all PetroVision products. Maintain a unique and effective look-and-feel for all products, with consistency within product lines, and, where possible, across product lines.

• Create and maintain all product code, user interfaces and components.

• Create and maintain an effective set of reusable components.

• Develop and use advanced inheritance strategies to maximize the effectiveness of enhancement and maintenance for a multi-version product with specialized extensions.

• Advise outside companies seeking to interface with or integrate PetroVision products into their own software / hardware product lines.

• Assist staff in troubleshooting especially difficult customer problems. Take corrective actions in design and implementation to minimize future recurrences of such problems.

• Provide pre-sales technical support for large customers or unusual product configurations / uses.

• Support installation development.

• Support website development.

• Monitor Internet newsfeeds for technical competition and synergistic products.

Product Mix

PetroVision products utilize state of the art GIS (Geographic Information System) mapping components and relational databases to assist customers in the retail distribution of petroleum and other bulk products. PetroVision supports dispatching through automated urgency assignment, load balancing, clustering, and routing. PetroVision products also support scheduling, marketing, and other business activities through the use of database technologies.

Two major product lines

• PetroVision Dispatch, a high-end petroleum specific dispatching product, written in a proprietary development package from MapInfo, and using specialized clustering and routing DLLs from an outside vendor.

• PVMapping, a generic product that has specialized versions for petroleum and for the use of automated metering equipment by petroleum users - it is a component-oriented product developed with Borland's C++ Builder and uses both Builder and Delphi components. New versions are being created for the bottled water and lawn care industries. The PetroVision Dispatch product will eventually be converted and merged with this product line as a specialized version.

Important Milestones

• Took over development of PetroVision Dispatch from a consultant. Interacted with vendors of clustering and routing components to improve their product and ours. Completed the product and brought it to market. Supported beta testers, installers, manual development, and marketing staff. Provided post-sales support until product stability, and then handed off to support staff. Worked with MIT researcher to develop proposals for advanced routing and sequencing techniques to be incorporated in future development of the product. Assisted in closing several sales. Established productive relationships with cooperating vendors. Remotely supervised testing staff.

• Shifted technology focus from MapInfo proprietary development environment to more advanced C++ / RAD (Rapid Application Development) environment using Borland component technology and MapX ActiveX mapping component. Developed PVMapping, and via system inheritance and component development was able to reuse the entire core system to produce and maintain more specialized versions. Supported installation staff in use of Install Shield, and documentation staff in creating paper and (on-line in product) HTML documentation. Assisted in closing several sales. Established productive relationships with cooperating vendors.

• Developed and supported five major and many minor releases of the product. Evolved product architecture to add flexibility, reduce development time, and to allow marketing of product variations with minimal additional maintenance load. Engaged in R&D development in HTML, Java, CGI and CORBA. Have begun product architecture changes to allow the same product code to be fielded against desktop, multi-user desktop, client-server, and multi-tier database systems.

Working Environment

PetroVision was a tight entrepreneurial environment with a small staff expected to remain generalist enough to handle any challenge. They were physically dispersed and maintained contact through telephone, cell phone, e-mail, and modem download, plus occasional on-site face to face meetings, either at the home office or at some other location.

The company nearly failed in late 1999. They have since obtained new funding and changed their name.