He is one of the most reclusive political consultants in the business, gifted at honing the D'Amato image in New York and branching out more now with the Senator into the lucrative national arena.

For one thing, the Internet may not be such a lucrative arena after all.

In moving to extend its reach into the lucrative mobile-gaming arena with the introduction of the PlayStation Portable, Sony is emphasizing what makes its hand-held the un-Game Boy.

But as the rationalists seek to move from self-help groups to the lucrative arena of addiction treatment, they are meeting resistance from what they regard as a parochial treatment establishment.

As one of the first companies to step into the lucrative arena and potential growth market, Xerox's annual revenues soared from $40 million in 1960 to almost $3 billion in the early 1970s.

Encouraged by Rothstein, Shapiro and Buchalter entered the lucrative arena of New York labor racketeering working for Jacob "Little Augie" Orgen.

At Harvard, for example, about 40 percent of undergraduates in recent years went into the most lucrative corporate arenas like finance and consulting, based on surveys at the school year's end.

But it has no presence trading Nasdaq-listed stocks, nor does it compete in the lucrative arena of trading increasingly popular investments like exchange-traded funds, options and other derivatives.

Analysts say that to succeed, AT&T will have to take on the five regional Bells on their home turf in local-telephone markets even as the company tries to bulk up in the lucrative overseas arena.

Seven years ago, when he founded First Network, originally called the Deauville Savings and Loan, the savings and loan business seemed a lucrative arena for aggressive entrepreneur like Mr. Rheuban.