The Shipping News Thinking inside the box led this entrepreneur to develop a novel shipping system.

Bill Van Wyck really knows how to get things moving. After all, in June he unveiled RedRoller Inc., a free web-based shipping system (in beta as of press time) that not only compares shipping rates and service offerings across multiple carriers, but also completes shipping transactions. Van Wyck, 40, describes his Norwalk, Connecticut, business as "the Travelocity of shipping packages." The first-of-its-kind service has already been integrated into eBay; integration into applications such as QuickBooks and Peachtree is underway.

The idea isn't new, but Van Wyck is the first to successfully package it into a business--after two years of development and some perfect timing. The proliferation of broadband, the existence of various major carriers in the marketplace and the availability of tools that allow for ever-changing data to be updated all collided, creating what Van Wyck describes as the perfect storm--and a very bright future. In 2005, the global mail and package market was valued at $312 billion. Says Van Wyck, "There aren't many market opportunities much bigger than that."