E-Commerce Beyond Japan

Millipore's European and Latin American e-commerce customers also tap into the Netli network. Performance improvement in Europe has not been as dramatic as in Japan because Millipore's connectivity to Western Europe was "pretty good" prior to initiating the Netli service, O'Halloran says.

Millipore earlier this year extended e-commerce services to Brazil, the company's most recent online sales endeavor. Netli has a virtual data center there.

Looking back on the Netli project, O'Halloran says the decision to maintain a single, centrally managed Web site has helped Millipore avoid excessive infrastructure costs.

And customers benefit from an experience that doesn't leave them pining for faxes.

As O'Halloran puts it: "The customers' experience is the most important aspect of what we do."