Data warehousing software house Micostrategy Inc says it will embark on its initial public offering at some point during the coming year. The Vienna, Virginia-based company is entering its quiet period, with the intention of floating on Nasdaq. Chief executive officer and co-founder Michael Saylor says the company will concentrate on the development of technology to underpin the establishment of large online data warehouses for public access. Saylor wants the general public to be able to get hold of data deemed to be in the public interest – or in his typically flamboyant style to purge ignorance from the planet and make the world a better place. Such data would come from large organizations and governments, and would be made available because of its economic potential. Microsstrategy believes the Public Information Technology will be completed within the next few years, and implemented within five, and the resulting revenues will help boost Microstrategy up to a $1bn company. Meanwhile, Microstrategy is working on the further development of its DSS Agent tool (CI No 3,115) that would enable it to push information proactively to pagers, mobile phones and other portable devices. Corporate vice president of international sales, Eouroo Sanchez is staying tight-lipped about the project, codenamed Bigmouth, but says Microstrategy should make an official announcement before the end of the first quarter of next year. The DSS Server online analytical processing engine is also set to see some technological additions, with the company promising delivery of full security features to support working with the web. DSS Server 5.0 has just been announced (CI No 3,279), but the next version, code-named Caster, will be the first ful 32-bit version – current versions being a combination of 16 and 32-bit code. Microstrategy, established in 1989, has an organic growth rate of 120% per year. It has grown from 226 employees up to 548 since January, and managed to build its newly established German base in Cologne up to 42 staff in one year. Sanchez says the company has reached the second year of a ten- year period where it will be able to sustain such growth rates. Both he and Saylor say with confidence and straight faces that, one day, Microstrategy will be bigger than Microsoft.