Archive

The nine states suing Microsoft for antitrust violations have accused the Redmond, Washington-based software maker of plotting to monopolize the media player market and edge out market leader RealNetworks. Bolstering that contention, an attorney for the states produced an e-mail sent in 1999 by M...

America Online has dumped Overture's pay-for-placement search service in favor of Google's similar AdWords offering, depriving Overture of one of its biggest customers and sending the company's shares plummeting nearly 36 percent. Overture said it expects net income in the second quarter will amo...

Name-your-price travel company Priceline.com turned a $3.9 million profit in the first quarter as hotel and car rental deals helped offset continued weakness in airline ticket sales. Revenue dropped 3 percent to $262 million in the quarter compared with the first three months of 2001. "Lower airl...

Shopping online is a far different experience than it is offline. With few exceptions, when people shop online they are on their own. How did consumers come to accept such a double standard? Among other factors, a slump in the quality of brick-and-mortar customer service may underlie this apparen...

Despite a lengthy shakeout that has thinned the ranks of e-tailers, consumers still face a dizzying array of choices when deciding where to shop online. But the market is already starting to become better defined. Some categories -- such as online toys, where Toysrus.com has broken out of the pac...

EBay was kind enough to remind me this week that if I ever need to buy a boat, that's the place. Or a camper. Or an airplane. That's it, an airplane. I knew there was something missing from my driveway. Maybe it's just me, but if I need to buy something -- especially something as big and expensiv...

A two-year trend of fewer early-stage companies receiving venture funding continued in the first quarter, with total private investment in startups dropping 24 percent, according to a study by the National Venture Capital Association, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Venture Economics. For the first th...

Hewlett-Packard has received a green light from a Delaware court to pursue its plans to merge with Compaq. The $18 billion deal hung in the balance while the court heard a suit brought by dissident shareholder and former HP director Walter Hewlett. But Delaware Judge William Chandler was not sway...

Tech business is getting interesting again. It's clear already that the most interesting, attention-grabbing tech business news of 2002 will unfold in courtrooms scattered around the United States. If lawyers have their way, legendary analyst Henry Blodget, the folks at Idealab and many more char...

Credit cards remain the predominant mode of payment in e-commerce, but other online transaction methods have entered the market in recent years. According to experts, mediated payment services are particularly successful when used at online auction sites, and the clear winner in serving this mark...

According to reports, Microsoft is expected to purchase Danish enterprise software company Navision for about $1.2 billion. Navision released a statement that avoided any direct mention of the software titan but did confirm that the board is considering a deal. Such a purchase would follow up Mic...

In an effort to vault into the top tier of the crowded online travel field, Cendant has announced it will invest $40 million in a marketing campaign to promote its Trip.com Web site. Real estate and travel giant Cendant said it plans to offer round-the-clock telephone support and unpublished disc...

Internet-related companies fired 824 workers in April, marking just the second time in two years that the sector's monthly job loss total has been below 1,000, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The number of job cuts fell 47 percent from March, when 1,549 cuts were ...

A couple of years ago, money was no object when it came to e-commerce. Companies spent lavishly on technology in their rush to establish a Web presence. The economic picture has changed significantly, and companies now are much more careful when it comes to such spending. "The realization has sun...

Instant messaging (IM) can help e-commerce sites capture potential sales, but cost, service and technological hurdles must be cleared before IM can have a major impact, according to analysts. "Web sites have horrible problems with shopping cart abandonment rates. Having instant messaging, in many...