How did you first use computers? I started my career working for Siemens as a budget analyst, which was my introduction to using PCs and very early spreadsheets like VisiCalc (developed by Dan Brinkman for early Apple II machines) and SuperCalc. I encountered the net quite early on through content management and setting up websites as an advertising vehicle. Now, with e-mail and so on, I would consider myself to be a fairly heavy user.

Has there been a reappraisal of e-commerce after the dot.com slump? I think there's been a return to "is there really a business here?" We started in 1995 about six months after Netscape went public. So we started this because there was a real business need, not because the internet was there. The net has opened up the world and allowed us to use new technologies to proliferate and build our business, but I think the markets are saying "let's get back to basics. What's your business model and what is the value that you're trying to deliver to your customer base?"

Is the UK's net infrastructure in need of an overhaul?

Not for what we do. All companies, buyers and suppliers need to use our technology is access to the web. I think the net is well entrenched in the UK, and throughout Europe, and most people have good access to it.

So how does the UK compare in terms of e-commerce? I think there's a little bit of scepticism but in general the UK's a bit more adventurous and open to new things than what we see on the continent. On the Continent companies are more risk averse, so I think the UK is more closely aligned with the US in that regard.

Your website talks a lot of e-sourcing - what is it? E-Sourcing culminates in an online auction but we se it as a combination of market-making services, global supplier information and the technology for the online auctions. It's a process of identifying what is appropriate to put on an online auction, providing services to help prepare request for quotations that differ from those put together for a manual negotiation. Also, providing services around training and working with the company's existing suppliers, and introducing new suppliers.

How does your Quick Source technology work? It's a technology that allows a company to set up its own branded marketplace. It means that more of the sourcing process is left up to the customer.

Any favourite websites? So much of our business is done over the net that I tend to gravitate towards the content aggregators such as Yahoo! and AOL. They're logical portals to a whole variety of other services. Probably two or three times a year I purchase books at Amazon. I don't keep a tremendous number of bookmarks.

Visit: www.freemarkets.com