Latest white papers:
"" Turn Around! A brief guide to starting, growing and turning around your software or Internet company."
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Client List
Sample Clients Obtained
Alberta Power
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Federal Business Development Bank
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Obron Corp.
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Allstate Insurance
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Fred Deely Imports
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Ohio University
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American Management Assoc.
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AT&T Canada/Unitel
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Gabriel Dumont Institute
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Pacific Gas & Electric
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AT&T Canada Hardware
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Glaxo Canada
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Panasonic Industrial Co.
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Atlantis Aerospace
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General Nutrition Centre
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Philip Morris International, NY
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Atomic Energy of Canada
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General Research
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Philips I&E
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Ault Foods
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Grumman Data Systems
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Philips International BV, Netherlands
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Bank of Nova Scotia
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Gaio, San Jose, CA
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Philips PTIS BV
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Barber Colman
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Hagemayer (Australia) BV
Harley-Davidson
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Price Waterhouse
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Baxter Healthcare
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Hawker Siddeley
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PPG
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Baxter Healthcare (Renal Div.)
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Canada Heidelberg
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Baxter Pharmaseal
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Harris
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Rock Valley College, IL
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Beta Steel, IN
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HBE Software
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Bell Canada
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Hickory Springs Mfg.
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Reckitt & Colman
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Bell Northern Research
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Hoechst Celanese Canada
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Canada R.J. Donnelly & Sons Co.
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Bell South
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Hoechst Celanese Corp.
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RJR Nabisco
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Bellcore
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Hewlett-Packard
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Royal Bank of Canada
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Beta Steel Corp.
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IBM
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Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Illinois
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I.C.I
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S.C. Johnson
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Bristol Myers
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IMD, Lausanne
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Scot Page C. Ltd.
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Cable and Wireless UK (Henley Management College)
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Industry Canada
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Scott's Hospitality Ltd.
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Canada Post
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ITESM, Leon, Mexico
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Siemans Electric
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CIBC
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Illinois Institute of Technology
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Sistemica S.A. de C.V.
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California Credit Union League
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Inland Steel Industries
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Society Bank, OH
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Campbell Soup
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Initiative Creation d'Emplois d Montreal
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Spartus Corp.
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Cdn Industrial Innovation Centre
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iPark, San Jose
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St. Stanislaus Credit Union
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Caremark
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International Business Incubator
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Stanley Tools
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Ciba Geigy, Switzerland
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Jac Levens BV, Netherlands
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Strong Equipment Corp.
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Ciba Vision
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John Alden Life Insurance
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Sun Life of Canada
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CIC Insurance
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Lakeshore Etobicoke Community
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Sunstrand Corporation, IL
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Civil Service Coop
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Credit Union
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Credit Coopers & Lybrand
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3M Canada
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Cooper Interaction Design, CA
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Marion Merrill Dow
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The James River Corp., IL
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DCI NV
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Master Lock
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Teachers Credit Union, South Bend, Indiana
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Dansk Teknologisk Institut
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Metropolitan Toronto
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De Melker Veenendaal
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Miami University, OH
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Union Carbide Canada
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Dept. of National Defence
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Miles Canada
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University de Laval
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DSM BV
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Ministry of Consumer & Corp. Relations
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Unitel Communications
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Dupont Canada
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Mohawk College
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UOP, Chicago
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Metro Toronto
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E.I. Dupont & Nemours
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Northern Telecom Inc.
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Van Leer Packaging, Netherlands
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Eclipse
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Northern Telecom Ltd.
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Eli Lilly Canada
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Northwestern Mutual Life, WI
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Wella BV
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Exxon Chemical International, Belgium
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Whittman Hart
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Eforex, Inc.
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nWilson Greatbatch Ltd.
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Alistair Davidson Career to Date
 CEO and Founder, May 1999 - present, Eclicktick Corporation, Palo Alto, CA. Business development and business improvement activities for a wide variety of high tech and health care companies, including:
 a large US computer, printer and network solutions vendor, marketing and network solutions strategy, VAR and value added analysis;
 a startup UK healthcare vendor, market assessment and channel selection;
 a medical products Chinese joint-venture, seeking to penetrate the US market;
 a Silicon Valley user interaction design company, business case justification;
 a Canadian portal vendor, switch from product to services strategy;
 Japanese software developer for embedded systems, revision of failed launch strategy, sales and tradeshow strategy;
 International Business incubator and iPark Business incubator , improving sales cycles and marketing literature, product launch strategy, negotiating distribution; 35 Korean US subsidiaries and other startups or US launches, launch and distribution strategy;
 Oakland financial services startup - changed business strategy from in-house development to strategic alliance and distribution model;
 CEO, foreign exchange 35 person ASP (turnaround assignment) - obtained first million dollar a year ASP customer prior to product completion, and negotiated unique strategic relationship with Citibank to access their SWIFT wire transfer system. Preliminary negotiation of strategic alliance with HP. Turned around failed product development process, bringing a completely restarted product to beta in 8 months on 20% of previous failed budget.
Co-founder, Chairman and CEO, Alacritous Inc., Toronto, (1985-1999)/Alacrity Inc., Toronto) and Allstar Advice Inc.
Products and services sold included packaged software, strategic and training consulting, facilitation services, IT consulting, IT strategy consulting, third party software, systems integration, database applications, information warehousing, business intelligence, performance tracking and process control optimization. Sold and delivered products in multiple languages and countries. Increased productivity of developer team by a factor of 20X through a change in technology strategy, personnel training and tools.
Strategic alliances set up with hardware and software vendors and other consulting firms in projects as large as $100M. Ten major products brought o market. International distribution set up. Two thirds of sales obtained were outside Canada, primarily in the US.
Vice President, Trans Canada Press, Toronto 1983-86. Publisher of various Who's Who directories and business book club. Started up and developed business book direct mail program. Company successfully sold to CB Media. Launched pioneering first in class products to over 250 companies internationally, transformed packaged software business into consulting business with 7-figure average consulting assignments, transformed consulting business into enterprise software and services company, largest individual relationship closed of $5M.
Associate (first in strategy area and then in marketing and economics area), Woods Gordon, Toronto (then Arthur Young International, now Cap Gemini, Ernst & Young) 1984-5. Business development, strategy, marketing, industrial policy and technology consulting. Woods Gordon was the leading Canadian owned strategy firm during this period. Business development success ($1M) equivalent to a partner in first year.
Head, Strategic Planning, Toronto office, Laventhol & Horwath, Toronto and Ottawa (now part of PriceWaterhouseCoopers), Toronto, 1982-3. Management consulting firm. Started up strategy practice. Business development and practice startup. Seconded briefly to Ottawa to develop policy for Brian Mulroney, then Leader of the Opposition, later Prime Minister of Canada for two terms. Used publications to generate $1.5M of publicity for firm, and set up significant public sector consulting assignments in the $10M range in addition to consulting assignments closed..
New Venture Analyst, Alberta Ventures Fund, Calgary, 1981-2.
Treasury Officer, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, Toronto (subsidiary of Torstar Corporation), Toronto, 1979-81. Harlequin was setting up numerous international subsidiaries during this period. Harlequin at this period was the most successful company in Canada and the second largest paperback publisher in the world. It introduced P&G style consumer packaged goods marketing to the paperback book industry and altered the channel of distribution significantly. Syndicated a US$35M loan to five banks and set up international financing arrangements and cash flow management.
Account Officer and Senior Account Officer, Mercantile Bank of Canada, Toronto and Montreal (Citibank), 1976-9. Business development for two years. Developed first two film finance deals for bank (first film: Cinepix “Meatballs”, starring Bill Murray).
Education
 M.B.A., Second Year Honors, Harvard Graduate School of Administrative Studies, Boston, Mass., USA, 1976
 A.B., cum laude, Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass., USA, 1974.
 Fluent English and French. Previously, reasonably fluent in German.
Other Accreditations and Experience
 Certified to administer Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, 1995
 Trained as a strategic facilitator and has trained strategic facilitators.
 Taught strategy, international strategy and best practices in IT strategy and project management at MBA and corporate settings.
Publications Developed for Business Development Purposes for Consulting Firms
Marketing conceptual or knowledge based products such as consulting often requires different marcom approaches than other industries. A technique first made popular by McKinsey with In Search of Excellence is the development of thought leadership positions promoted through books, articles, magazines and white papers. Alistair Davidson is on the board of editorial advisors for Strategy and Leadership magazine.
Books Developed for Promoting Consulting Firms
Davidson, Alistair: Turn Around! A brief guide to starting, growing or turning around your software or Internet business, Eclicktick E-Book, February, 2001. Practical guidelines on starting, growing and turning around software or Internet companies dealing with business development, distribution, product management, financial and strategic issues.
Davidson, Alistair, Gellman, Harvey and Chung, Mary: Riding The Tiger, HarperCollins Canada, Toronto, 1997, Second US edition, Jist Publications 1999. Subject matter: best practices in software development, project management and technology usage. Assessed by some senior IT managers as a classic in the field.
Davidson, Alistair and Fisher, Ralph: Seizing the Future, Trans Canada Press, 1983. Strategy and technology issues profiled for generating strategy and policy consulting assignments.
Business Development Speeches and Presentations
 iPark business incubator, San Jose, October and November 2002
 Young Executives Organization, San Francisco, April 2001
 Association for Corporate Growth, Silicon Valley Chapter, March 2001
 The Enterprise Network (TEN-NET/NASA Ames Incubator), March 2001
 Various speeches and seminars for IIR, IQPC, Insight 1997/98/99 on performance measures for improving IT performance.
 Association for Management Information in Financial Services, Annual Meeting, Phoenix, 1998 (workshop, speech and panel)
 Department of Energy, Federal Energy Technology Center, Technology Decision Process Workshop, Morgantown, West Virginia, June 1998
 LMDS (fixed wireless broadband) Conference, Dallas 1998
 Institute for International Research, IT Performance Measures for the IT Function Conference, Toronto, April 1998
 XPO Toronto Chapter, September 1997 (ex-members of the Young Presidents' Organization)
 George Weston/Loblaw Companies - IT Managers' conference, September, 1997
 Canadian Association of Business Officers, St. Catherines, Annual Meeting, 1997
 Credit Union National Association (CUNA), Philadelphia, Annual Meeting, 1996
 American Bankers Association (ABA), Honolulu, Annual Meeting 1996
 CMA Society of Ontario, 1995
 Canadian Credit Union Marketing Conference, Victoria, BC 1995
 Various universities and colleges in Canada, the US and Europe
 Planning Forum, now Strategic Leadership Forum (Ottawa, Toronto, Minneapolis, Chicago, Los Angeles and Pittsburgh)
 Television and radio appearances in Toronto, Ottawa, Kingston, Vancouver and San Jose.
Areas of particular expertise include:
 Improving new product success rates
 Introducing gate point models for new product funnel management
 Shortening sales cycles
 Sales training and coaching
 Improving technology company marketing messages
 Setting up new high tech companies
 Setting up international distribution and negotiating strategic alliances
 Object oriented design and object oriented databases
 Budgeting and planning systems
 Activity based costing models
 Game and simulation design
 Best practices in software project management
 IT policy and strategy
 Evaluating IT and information management projects from a strategic and return perspective.
 Selling complex technology solutions.
 Performance improvement and balanced scorecard.
 Strategic facilitation.
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