Campus Pipeline catches a new wave.

• Author: Beers, Heather
• Position: Tech Talk

In the late 1990s, Campus Pipeline Inc. was riding what seemed like a perfect wave, with innovative offerings in a relatively underserved market and capital investors including American Express, Dell Computer Corp., General Motors Corp. and Hewlett-Packard.

The Salt Lake City-based company had quickly become a leader in providing software services that unify college and university digital campuses. These services enable higher education institutions to integrate disparate technologies found among schools' various departments, offices and student services with a unified look and information distribution system. Campus Pipeline's client list was growing, and prospects looked bright.

But in 2000, the current changed. As the technology sector slumped, Campus Pipeline faced a common challenge: how to revise its business model to survive and flourish in a new New Economy.

Tom Lewis, chairman and CEO, joined the company in November 2000 to find that new wave. His extensive experience includes serving as CEO of Ameritrade Holding Company, an Omaha-based leader in online brokerage and financial services. As CIO and vice president at Baltimore-based USF&G, he helped establish the company as one of the nation's most technologically advanced insurance companies. Previously, he had been head of technology for the Executive Office of the President in the Reagan administration.

At Campus Pipeline, Lewis prepared to find a new path to profitability. "The company's original concept in 1998 was to give away software to colleges and universities as a front end and to make money by selling ad space. When cost-per-clicks plummeted, we needed to transition from an ad impression-based model to a licensed-based model," says Lewis.

Lewis knew the challenge would be telling customers what was once free would now cost them. "We had to come up with a value proposition that was so far in excess of what they could have had...