BACKGROUND: The business of providing e-education, e-training and e-jobs is high growth for as far as the eye can see. There are over 1.2 million college courses available from thousands of accredited universities worldwide.² Over half of all Fortune 500 companies operate a corporate university and all are now engaged in training by electronic means.³ Half of all homes in Western Europe, North America and Japan will be Net connected by the end of next year.⁴ Lifetime learning and virtual events and virtual conferences are here to stay as evidenced by Hambrecht & Quist which continues to be optimistic about publicly traded companies in their "learning" group.⁵ Bandwidth is not a problem. Neither is the acquisition cost of new hardware or software, both of which continue to follow a long pattern - more for less. Neither is content, which will get cheaper - even as the demand for it increases.

Investors, correctly, do not worry about whether these macro trends will continue. In a knowledge economy, the engines of growth will come from knowledge workers who will acquire more and more of their skills by distance means. That is as sure as tomorrow.

FRIEND: This project envisions the placement of thousands of 40 foot Vans worldwide. Inside the Van is all that is needed to provide e-education, e-training, and e-jobs. Outside is 800 square feet of advertising and promotional signage space. On the roof are both a satellite dish and a radio antenna enabling independent radio broadcasting to a radius of 20 kms and Internet reach to the rest of the planet. Vans sit on trailers where they can be affordably moved to more profitable locations if necessary. Vans are multi-purpose school houses and training centers designed for those who seek degrees from Harvard or Stanford, or training from CISCO or Microsoft, or e-games from Sega or Nintendo, or medical consultation from Mayo or Georgetown, or telework jobs from Amazon or WebCT. In essence Vans are a "knowledge factory" where the profits come by brokering education, training and jobs. First year loses for each Van are approximately $135,000. Thereafter, net before tax profits are forecasted at approximately $150,000 per Van.