Posted on 09/27/2006 12:46:03 PM PDT by kenn5
Annapolis company's systems help to monitor employees' computer use By ANDREW CHLDERS, Staff Writer
Marylanders know a thing or two about surviving the tedium of work, ranking among the nation's top time-wasters on the job.
But Ermis Sfakiyanudis and Alan Schunemann are just determined to ruin it for everyone.
ETelemetry in Annapolis specializes in business intelligence, helping firms to track their own technology infrastructure and people, to find out who's working diligently and who's updating a MySpace profile or rearranging a Netflix queue. The bane of office loafers everywhere, eTelemetry's Metron and Locate network trackers can pinpoint individual "bandwidth hogs" on a company's network, even tallying the time individual employees spend surfing the net.
"Web pages aren't very big. You can surf all day and it wouldn't show on a bandwidth graph," said Mr. Schunemann, eTelemetry's chief technology officer.
And the average worker spends a lot of time surfing. According to a recent survey by America Online and salary.com, Maryland ranks 16th in the nation for time wasted at work, with 2.4 hours a day going down the tubes, costing employers an estimated $17 billion in wages annually. Missouri workers rank as the nation's loafing kings, with more than three hours of each workday squandered.
While a quarter of that time went to chit-chat with co-workers and two minutes of company time went to looking for a new job, by far the most common time drain was the Internet. Workers blow an hour each day just surfing the Net.
The folks at eTelemetry have even turned their systems on themselves, raising a few eyebrows when their own employees' Internet use was tracked.
"It's amazing what we've discovered," Mr. Schunemann said. "Very useful from a manager's perspective."
But busting employees for tweaking their fantasy football rosters is only one benefit of eTelemetry's systems, which provide companies with "business intelligence." Metron and Locate simply plug into existing network hardware to evaluate how well systems interact and where Internet bandwidth should be allocated most effectively.
"Some of our customers use it as a resource tool to allocate resources," Mr. Sfakiyanudis said.
In the rush to add the most updated technology during the 1990s, some businesses may have overlooked ensuring that all of the components worked together optimally, and eTelemetry has carved out a niche in the technology market helping companies make the most out of the infrastructure they already have.
"Now you can add some sanity," said Mr. Sfakiyanudis, company president.
The company, founded by Mr. Sfakiyanudis and Mr. Schunemann in 1999, is growing exponentially. Last week eTelemetry moved into new larger offices as it announced $4 million in venture funding that will more than double the size of the company within the next year.
From 12 full-time staffers now, the company expects to grow to 25 or 30 people by late 2007. Connecticut-based Centripetal Capital Partners is investing $4 million to continuing developing Locate and Metron.
"Critical to our decision-making is solid evidence of a competitively advantaged, strong and proprietary product that meets an unmet or underserved need in a large and growing market," Centripetal Capital principal Jeff Brodlieb said in a statement issued this week.
Part of a growing tech community in Anne Arundel, eTelemetry has also become a refuge for a number of former USinternetworking employees. Mr. Schunemann and Janice Roper-Graham, vice president of marketing, both spent time at USi, and they credit the enthusiasm generated by that firm for spawning a swath of other, smaller tech businesses in the county.
Drawing on his business background and geekish proclivities, Mr. Schunemann said the goal of eTelemetry was to meld the two previously incompatible worlds.
"I wanted to do something good for business with geek stuff," he said.
I'm working too diligently to read this article.
The b*st*rds!!!
It was bound to happen.
These types of products have been out for a long time.
Of course, you can load up all sorts of spreadsheets and walk away from your desk and it "looks" like you are doing work (unless the keystroke logger is invoked, then you have to claim to be studying.).
There goes Free Republic. All that will be left will be the old codgers in their Florida and Arizona condos.
Oh sh$$t, I'm in trouble now....
>>>"I wanted to do something good for business with geek stuff," he said.>>>
Yeah, thanks alot Mr. Do-Gooder. You're the kind of suck up that I beat up in school.
Sheesh.
Just don't make one for my wife.
Victor ends transmission
Well then, it's a good thing that I'm the IT manager now!
Everyone who calculates how much labor is wasted by folks spending time on the web assumes every minute would otherwise be productive. It ain't so for most of us corporate drones.
It be interesting to see someone calculate an effective impact, compared with time wasted on lower tech methods.
I wonder how well it shows what is going on when system response time is measured in tens of seconds, and constant IMs are going out...but only a few inputs into work-related stuff every minute.
There are ways around the keystroke logger, too.
They still can't track Freecell.
If internet surfing is such a problem, why is productivity so high?
And the IT managers, the government employees and small business owners...
Do we self-employed folks have to install it, too?
>>>Well then, it's a good thing that I'm the IT manager now!>>>
Yeah, wish I were in charge of those decisions!
So, uhh, Mr. IT guy, how can I get around this thing, hehe.
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