The UK-based company supplies the knowhow behind some of the world's busiest transaction systems, dealing with more than 20 million callers or a million website "hits" (visits) a day.

Websites and telephone call centres enable businesses to generate millions of customers almost overnight and one computer systems company helping some of the largest international groups to cope with transactions is Sentient.

A typical customer is espotting.com, a company that flags up commercial websites to enable surfers to find them more easily. This creates millions of automatic small-value transactions and, for every hit on a client site, espotting.copm needs to bill advertisers and to credit surfers.

To help such companies, Sentient - based near London -offers a complete development service ranging from idea to implementation for all those who need an e-business or web solution individually tailored to their needs.

This process is both iterative and evolutionary and is based upon continually involving from the outset the people who will use the system.

Achieving this is derived from a unque methodology called assisted evolution. This is an approach that entails Sentient's highly skilled staff employing a selection of the latest available tools and technologies to produce mock-ups of any system so the intended user can gain hands-on exposure while, at he same time, ensuring that any fundamental changes to its architecture do not create any problems.

Assisted evolution (AE) contains a six-part process that offers clients reduced risk through a partnership approach along with a guaranteed delivery. Sentient is so confident in its product that it guarantees to refund a percentage of the development costs if the solution is not delivered as originally agreed.

The first part is called AE Scoping in which Sentient identified the key players and business concepts involved. By asking clients to look at what they want in a different way it is able to determine the desired interface, alaong with current process documentation and language, to ensure that the finished product blends seamlessly with existing working practices.

This is followed by AE Time Travel which allows the client to "play" with a mock-up of the user interface to ensure that it meets their exact needs. This is backed up by documented workflow and processes, together with a project plan highlighting key landmarks and shared goals and expectations.

AE Build and Test consists of weekly project meetings to keep both sides on track. Then there is AE Pilot that is centred around user-acceptance testing with a Sentient technologist working onsite to ensure smooth running.

The penultimate phase is AE Live after the new system goes online for the first time. Finally, there is AE Evolve that involves a unique support contract which offers a pool of development days that can be used for either support or change requests. This offers the flexibility to add extra functionality as required, as well as the knowledge that clients can rely on support for all their solutions.

Sentinet was formed eight years ago by three computer systems engineering graduates from Warwick Univesity in the English Midlands, including two who had worked on the United States strategic defence initiative programme, Star Wars.

They explain that thier basic approach is to "de-risk" the latest communications technology before helping clients to adopt it in their own companies, a process that has evolved into assisted evolutions. Their business to date has been focused on four sectors of the marketplace. These are Telco, Finance, Media, and Dotcom, primarily because of their competitive nature.

It has been identified by many of Sentient's clients that in order to stay ahead of the competition, they must look at other ways in which to attract new customers and retain existing ones.

E-commerce, customer relationship management and data warehousing play a very important part in this. With this in mind Sentient has helped its customers to raise the power of e-business and establish systems that are scalable, flexible and technologically superior in order to meet their changing business needs.

The company worked on the last Whitbread Round The World yacht race, the first major use of a website for a sporting event. Three years ago, they were recommended to Worldcom, one of the largest telecoms companies, and their bluechip client list includes Telewest, Cable & Wireless, NatWest Bank, DG Bank and the National Gallery (London).

Usually, Sentient refuses any project lasting more than three months. Its chief executive officer Jonathan Greensted explained: "Technology is developing so quickly that, if you cannot do it in three months, it is probably the wrong thing to be doing."