In this computer age, when all our offices are supposed to be paperless, why do you still have to send a written curriculum vitae to your prospective employer?

It's something that bugged Mr Michael Keating. Having scratched his head a bit, he thought CVs could be done differently. And the answer? CVSONCDS.

It's a small company Mr Keating and his partner, Aidan Healy, have formed and it is in start-up mode at the South-East Business and Innovation Centre in Waterford Industrial Park, one of three new companies in the centre.

If you bring in your written CV, they will put it on disk, videotape an interview with you and "burn it on to a CD Rom".

Michael explains: "The person takes away the CD, goes to an employer and he can look at it in his own time."

CVSONCDS will also keep CVs on file and, if you wish, include it with other job applications down the line.

This saves you doing an application each time and saves the employers' time, when they can look at a number of applications in one go.

It appears nobody else in the Republic is delivering this kind of service.

"There are a number of spin-offs also," Mr Keating says. "Interactive family albums and family trees, for example." He has taken out copyright on the idea but says he cannot afford to patent it.

Mr Keating comes from Kildare but has settled in Waterford. Although he has no background in computers - he was in the security business and worked with Allied Signals in Waterford - his brother, a lecturer in NUI Maynooth, has been a great help.

Beside him in the centre are brothers Nicky and Ray O'Brien, who have developed the Irish Gift Market Ltd website, as yet unlaunched. It will be introduced to the market in approximately two months.

"Our business is basically getting suppliers and retailers in the Irish giftware trade to order online. They are not doing it already.

"It's been done in other countries so we see the market is ripe for this," Nicky explained.

The concept is simple: basically, the website dispenses with phone, fax and mail interaction between suppliers and retailers.

"We are going to take enormous cost out of the relationship but we are going to take some of that cost," he says, explaining how his website is going to be financed.

The website will be introduced in October and Nicky believes it will be of enormous benefit in relation to the euro changeover. At the flick of a switch, accurate, up-to-date information will be available around the clock.

Nicky O'Brien worked in financial management with Eircom, before buying the Bewley's franchise in Waterford and he also operated a Centra store. His brother's background was in the giftware business, in sales with Waterford Crystal in Ireland, Britain and the United States.

These are the first entrepreneurs in the new incubation centre. In all, there are 11 places and each company is expected to stay for its first six to nine months.

Mr Dick Hickey, the chairman of South-East Business and Innovation Centre, says that the south-east region has one of the highest unemployment areas in the Republic and this is a serious effort to make a serious contribution to solving the problem.

The centre was started in 1995 and is looking to attract entrepreneurs from outside the region.