Any guidance on the appropriate development technologies/platform appreciated.

I'm looking to provide the following...

1) Vitural Earth (full page view)
2) Custom Transpartent Overlay Menus (similar to standard map zoom control but more elaborate for data filtering)
3) Import Coordinate Information

Thanks

Here's a big list of resources currently available for Virtual Earth Development. This should help point you in the right direction.

Virtual Earth Developer Resources (http://pietschsoft.com/page/Virtual-Earth-Developer-Resources.aspx)

Also, you'll want to look at the "Virtual Earth: Map Control Development (http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vemapcontroldev/threads/)" forums over at the MSDN Forums website.

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vemapcontroldev/threads/