Executive Vice President William J. Pesce was appointed to lead this group. Stephen Smith assumed the new post of Senior Vice President, International Development. Previously, Mr. Smith was Vice President, Asia. Now based in London, he is responsible for directing Wiley operations in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. In addition to identifying prospective acquisitions of companies and product lines abroad, he will evaluate opportunities to publish and copublish in languages other than English.
Technology is a powerful tool in our global business.
With the rollout of our CORE distributed information system this past fall, Wiley's technical support infrastructure now reaches around the world, linking all company locations. Several years ago, Wiley's non-U.S. subsidiaries operated with a high degree of autonomy. One of the major recent changes is the tremendous amount of teamwork that now takes place among locations, facilitated by Core and other new technologies. Visitors find a range of offerings, including our general catalog, annual report, discussion forums, free software, and sample book chapters. Nearly 10,000 visitors a week are clicking onto our Web site.