UNC Pembroke’s Regional Center for Economic, Community and Professional Development has launched Internet services for individuals, corporations and governments.
The Regional Center launched www.uncpembroke.net, which designs and maintains websites for different clients, a year ago.
The Lumberton Area Chamber of Commerce, the Robertson County Board of Commissioners, a gospel group, a doctor’s office and a hardware store are among the customers of the new service.
The service was launched because the Regional Center noticed the need for the development of small business through the Internet, but no local company offered a similar service. Advanced Internet Technologies, Inc., a web hosting company based in Fayetteville, is a partner on the project.
Sylvia Pate, Regional Center Director, said that the project originated from a workshop on e-commerce organized by the Center where it discovered that no local company offered service that could be used by small businesses to get on the Internet. She added that the new service launched by the Regional Center fills this gap and is a valuable and growing part of the Center’s outreach mission into the communities it serves.
Reggie Oxendine, a UNCP computing consultant, is in charge of www.uncpembroke.net. He said that although the service of designing, hosting and maintaining websites is in its startup stage, everything was going smoothly and interest in the was beginning to grow.
Mr. Oxendine noted that the service was easy to use and affordable for small businesses. He pointed out that a small website of half-a-dozen pages, ten e-mail accounts and low maintenance requirements could be launched in three weeks and would cost a customer $25 per month. Business transaction services and “shopping cart” software required additional fees, Mr. Oxendine said. He added that the services included domain name registration and submission of the site to leading search engines.
