Business Solutions has a simple mission statement: to help boost the efficiency of small and medium sized companies (SMEs) by promoting the beneÞts of new technology. Britain's economic success in the decades ahead depends critically on successful small businesses expanding into bigger ones. Expansion is partly needed to compensate for all the big companies that are rapidly turning into smaller companies (like Marconi and the former British Leyland) but also to provide jobs for people displaced by the natural productivity improvements that large companies are forced to make to survive.

According to the latest statistics published by the Bank of England, SMEs account for 54% of the gross value added in the main industrial sector (a category that excludes public services, the Þnancial sector, forestry and fishing). Gross value added is the income generated by companies out of which wages, capital investment and interest charges are paid before arriving at profits.

The mere adoption of new technology - whether it is high-speed broadband internet access or the latest computers - will not in itself provide a competitive advantage but if you do not have it then your company will be vulnerable and Þnd it very difficult to succeed.

The days are long gone when companies thought they had joined the IT revolution simply by having their own websites. It is now accepted that companies must have an internet strategy encompassing everything from a well designed web presence to a functioning e-payments system.

But, even if a company's strategy consists of nothing more than a few simple web pages outlining what it does and how to contact it, this is far better than nothing at all. Why? Because of the phenomenon of "passive marketing". A lot of companies have found that they have become accidental exporters as a result of customers overseas coming across their products by chance in using search engines to scour the internet for components and services.

Since Business Solutions was launched two and a half years ago, the adoption of new technology has improved enormously. The latest Oftel Þgures show that over 2m or 63% of SMEs now have internet access. This compares with barely 20% a few years ago. But it still means that 37% of them don't. Even allowing for the fact that many of the rest are one-person operations or non-trading companies it still leaves a lot of companies that haven't woken up yet to the realities of the IT revolution. These days if you are without email, let alone the internet, it is a huge disadvantage in dealing with other companies for whom the instant communication that email affords (and the ability to transmit large documents) has proved a vital business tool.

Business Solutions and Online have strongly promoted the advantages of adopting broadband internet access to speed up communications and data transfer as well as broadband Wi-fi (wireless) connections under which all parts of your ofÞce or business can receive high speed web access instantaneously without having to lay down wires to multiple computers. Small companies across the land are now ganging together to produce enough corporate customers to make it worthwhile for BT to provide broadband in rural communities where it has so far been uneconomic to do so.

In this issue, Business Solutions' resident expert Guy Clapperton examines Þve essential technologies that SMEs should not be without. And Justin Hunt looks at how several companies have successfully used the web to improve their businesses. Business Solutions strongly believes that the government should do more to improve the environment in which SMEs operate. The most important thing is to provide a stable macro-economic background so companies can plan and invest in the knowledge that that there will not be a recession around the corner. The second is to act as advocate and facilitator for the adoption of IT. And the third is to reduce the ever growing mountain of red tape that companies have to contend with and which distracts them from the wealth creation process.

So far, this government has delivered on its pledge to avoid the excesses of the stop-go cycle. But the economy is now entering more treacherous waters as global growth slows down faster than expected and the rest of Europe slithers into recession. The government has made a brave start in being an advocate of IT but failed in its target to ensure that the UK had the best environment for e-commerce by the end of 2002 (did you miss the celebrations?). It still has a long way to go to bring red tape down to acceptable levels.

Small companies start with a handicap in that they know that 50% of new companies either fail or get taken over in the Þrst four years of their lives. They are naturally upset by the government's imposition of higher national insurance charges - even though they are going to fund a better health service from which everyone will benefit.

We believe that the government should foster a very competitive environment for small business and should not take decisions about business that can only be taken by executives at the coal face. At the same time it has a vital role in setting fair rules for competition and in helping to agree the standardisation criteria - like GSM for mobile phones - that are so important for international success. In return we believe that SMEs should be good corporate citizens, paying their due taxes, paying their employees decently and avoiding the corporate excesses that have soured the images of so many of the country's largest Þrms. If you would like to add your comments please email us at: online.feedback@theguardian.com

· Victor Keegan is editor of Online.