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3 September 2001
A young designer has come up with an Australian first which helps anyone produce professional-quality Web pages, presentations, brochures and emails.
Winner of the inaugural Yellow Pages E-Business Award, Template Central is the brainchild of Sydney designer, Paul Wilson.
TemplateCentral.com is a do-it-yourself Website that provides thousands of professional design templates to add impact to virtually any form of publication, be it digital or print.
It gives anyone, from students to big corporations, the power to create visually rich projects, regardless of their level of computer expertise.
Mr Wilson was teaching computer applications to business people when he noticed how bored his students were with the dull, repetitive stock-standard templates supplied in the software packages. After searching without success for more interesting commercial alternatives, he recognized a business opportunity.
He founded Template Central in 2000 and has quickly built it into an international e-business success, attracting customers from as far afield as New York and London - in fact, 92 per cent of the site's revenues come from outside Australia.
"Right from the beginning, I recognized that this business was ideally suited to the Internet since professional Web, presentation and other document templates could easily be made accessible to customers over the Web.
"The success of Template Central is largely due to its ability to enhance almost every form of published communication, whether it's being developed by creative professionals, large or small business users, students, consultants or home users. This solution is ideal for anyone who wants their work to look professional," he said.
Templates, images and other files are classified by category, industry type or software package, making it a simple matter to locate the best designs for each project. Template Central will also custom-design templates or graphic images to meet the specific needs of clients.
Mr Wilson said winning the Yellow Pages award, which comprises a $50,000 cash grant, specialized business mentoring and a $13,000 advertising package, is an important milestone for the business and will enable him to spread his wings even further.
"This is a very exciting opportunity that gives me access to both funding and business expertise to take Template Central to the next level," he said.
"Template Central is already the world's largest provider of common software application templates and my immediate goal is to continue redesigning the site offerings to meet the changing needs of my customers and maximize the growth potential."
According to Forrester Research, the downloadable software market is tipped to grow substantially over the next few years and Template Central is ideally poised to take full advantage.
Only three per cent of current online sales consist of digitally downloadable products, but Forrester expects this figure to rocket to 22 per cent, with a value of US$2.9 billion, by 2004.
Add to that the fact that millions of people around the world use the packages Template Central supports, ranging from Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Outlook through to Dreamweaver, FrontPage and GoLive, with more to be added over time, and the potential is exponential.
Media Contact: Paul Wilson
Email: paul@templatecentral.com
Phone: 61 2 9565 2400
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