Netscape software and an intranet network are helping Genentech employees be more efficient by providing a common interface to applications and by facilitating new ways to share information.

Netscape has solved one of Genentech's key challenges of finding a single user interface that works across diverse platforms. With Netscape, an application is developed once and made available to the entire company, saving development time and money.

The intranet has become Genentech's "online handbook." The company's human resources, engineering, environmental safety, legal, corporate communications, library, medical affairs, quality assurance, and security departments, among others, all have home pages. "It puts more information in the hands of employees to help them get their work done more effectively."

Employees are also using Web-based newsgroups and bulletin boards to increase communications and provide links between organizations.

Genentech chose Netscape Navigator for its intranet because Netscape:

• continues to incorporate emerging technologies
• is dedicated to open standards

Biotechnology pioneer Genentech discovers, develops, manufactures, and markets pharmaceuticals such as a human growth hormone and a blood clot-dissolving drug for heart attack patients. Based in South San Francisco, the company's business focuses on research and development, filing of applications for new drugs, clinical trials, data analysis, manufacturing, and shipping.

Netscape software and an intranet network are helping Genentech employees be more efficient by providing a common interface to applications and by facilitating new ways to share information.

Genentech has a corporate site license for Netscape Navigator. "It wasn't hard for us to decide that Netscape would do a good job for us when we rolled out our corporate web," says David Mischel of Genentech's Technology Development Department. "We liked the position that Netscape took regarding emerging technologies and open standards development. Standards are very important to us. And Navigator is a very attractive piece of software," he says.

COMMON INTERFACE ACROSS APPLICATIONS AND PLATFORMS

"The original reason we looked at Netscape and the Web was to provide one user interface to information for our end users," explains Mischel. "Formerly, information was held in a variety of different programs. Each one ran on a different machine and required a different syntax to access it. This made it hard to find information. Navigator has great potential as a universal interface to key applications."

Genentech has a heterogeneous computing environment with about 2000 Macintosh computers, 1000 Windows-based personal computers, and hundreds of UNIX workstations. "There is no software that runs on all of them. Often an application is developed for the majority of users but others couldn't get to it unless they went to use another system," he says.

"A user interface that gives people access to information without having to worry whether it runs on their workstation is a tremendous benefit," he says. "I develop an application once and it's available to everyone in the company. It saves time and money."

MORE EFFICIENT ACCESS TO INFORMATION

The intranet also allows Genentech employees to provide information directly to the entire company. Groups that are currently contributing information on the intranet include human resources, engineering, environmental safety, legal, corporate communications, the corporate library, medical affairs, quality assurance, and security.

Employees can access information on research seminars, company announcements, building facilities, the employee directory, commuting options, benefits, child care, how to place purchase orders, how to get business cards, safety equipment, and so forth. "The web is really an online employee handbook with information on how to do things at Genentech. It puts more information in the hands of employees to help them get their work done more effectively," he says.

The company developed Netscape forms-based applications for:

• a doctor-locator form to find a local specialist who is covered by employee health insurance
• equipment-recycling forms to broker used computers to other departments in the company; employees may view the inventory of available used equipment and then fill in a form requesting specific items
• registration for corporate workshops

Genentech has also written Netscape-based applications to automate routine activities. For example, they built software that allows the corporate communications department to write a press release and email it to a specialized address. The source is verified, the data is generated in HTML, and the press release is posted to the Web server.

The company is also looking at developing Web-based applications to aid in manufacturing. "We want to use Netscape and the Web to access manufacturing data. We have a prototype in development where data is imported from lab instruments into a Web page in graph form. It makes it very easy for people to read and interpret information," he says.

Finally, Genentech is using its intranet to increase communications between employees. People are exchanging information via newsgroups and bulletin boards. "The most effective has been newsgroups. They are very dynamic. People are able to communicate on a variety of topics," he says. "We're using the network news capability to provide in-house bulletin boards on subjects ranging from computing to project status reports to child care."

Genentech's departmental and project home pages are guides to help employees learn what is happening in the company. Employees profile individual members of the department with a snapshot and description of what they do. "It becomes a lot easier to know who is responsible for what. Prior to the Web, we did not have a mechanism to do that. So if I want to know who is doing computing in another area, I can go to the group's home page and find out who I should be talking to. It provides a good way to learn about fellow employees and target areas of expertise and responsibility," he says.

Netscape and the Web are opening up new computing capabilities for Genentech. "We want to focus and broaden the use of computer technology at Genentech," he says. "Netscape and the Web are advancing that significantly. We envision it becoming the central interface to electronic information in the company."

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