Problem:
The Marketing Director of a business unit  which develops and markets industrial control systems realizes that  his market share is not growing fast enough. He understands that with a smaller share of the market, his products, even though well designed and adapted to the market needs, will be perceived as proprietary technology and rejected as such. He knows he has to promote the idea that his products are easy to work with because they are based on open and recognized industry standards 

Solution:
Recognizing the importance of communities, he decides to create an independent business alliance with his business partners who also have a vested interest in growing the market share, with the mission to actively promote the interface standards chosen for his systems.  He deploys Kⁿ-Net™ as the online infrastructure of this business alliance. With Kⁿ-Net™, he and his partners publish all technical interface specifications and SDKs which can make their clients'  integration work more easy, and link those publications with their authors. Since every knowledge transfer on Kⁿ-Net™ is monetized, he provides true incentives for the business partners of the alliance to grow the knowledge base. Thus, he creates an active online venue, that any of his customers can access, and providing them with:

• A library of technical interface specifications in a common format 

• A catalog of authored SDKs and software components that can be downloaded from the site

• A global directory of real experts that can be questioned online

• Instant online advice and services from those experts 

Benefits:
By creating a community of experts around the interfacing standards of his products and systems, he has delivered a new powerful selling point to his sales force. Instead of arguing on "proprietary" vs. "open" technology, sales people can show their clients in a very practical way that a managed, cross-company community of experts is out there to provide them with immediate assistance on product implementation. Customers have objective data about the adoption rates of the interface standards chosen. They realize that they are not locked with just one supplier, and recognize that they can join an active community that can make their job more easy. 

The result is sales growth by removing the trust barrier by establishing and managing a network of contributors to your product strategy