Coming soon on the web... A range of new features will be arriving soon. There will be exclusive, specially-commissioned reports on topical IT and telecoms themes, regular profiles of promising vendors, an expanded Consultants' corner section, and occasional book reviews, along with translated IT feature articles from our German language sister paper, FT Deutschland. Focus on web services Plugging in to release power of the net Web services are speeding up the long evolution of systems integration in the commercial and industrial world, but leading IT suppliers and software developers are fighting for dominance in this emerging market Mechanisms of web services Another portion of alphabet soup This is not the first time that a new trend in IT has come served with an overloaded side-plate of initials and acronyms - but the mechanisms they describe will be vital if web services are to work properly Manufacturing applications Streamlined links with business partners Amid the promised benefits of web services for manufacturing industries, they nevertheless demand big organisational changes. Most users will therefore prefer gradual implementation Grid computing Harnessing hidden reserves of PC power Grid computing is described as ‘the fifth wave of the IT revolution’. It will have great implications for both the systems vendors and users.