Archive

The ability to use an Internet auction to solicit sealed electricity contract bids played a crucial role in helping bring some order to California's protracted energy crisis, state officials told the E-Commerce Times. "If you waited for the normal paper process, it would have taken much longer and ...

Here's a neat party trick. Make a list of the profitable or nearly profitable e-commerce companies you know about. Then circle all the e-tail companies -- the ones that sell goods directly to consumers. If your list is anything like mine, there is a distinct lack of circles. No circles, no large e-t...

U.S. technology and e-commerce stocks were falling at midday Friday for a second day in a row, as a wave of earnings disappointments continued to keep investors on edge. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 52.54 at 2701.74 in late-morning trading, led by declines in Cisco Systems (Nasdaq: CSCO), ...

Ericsson (Nasdaq: ERICY) was down US$1.81 at $11.19 early Friday after the Swedish mobile-phone maker said results for the last quarter were weaker than analysts hoped, and that it would stop making its own products, outsourcing production instead. Ericsson said sales and orders were higher in the ...

BroadVision, Inc. (Nasdaq: BVSN) was down US$2.19 at $12.69 in morning trading Friday after missing analysts' targets for fourth-quarter 2000 growth. Analysts at firms including Prudential Securities, CIBC World Markets and First Union Securities reportedly downgraded their ratings on BroadVision a...

A sting operation started last fall led the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) to file civil lawsuits against two software pirates Thursday. Peter Beruk, SIIA's vice president in charge of anti-piracy, told the E-Commerce Times that several months ago, two people informed t...

The white knight who pulled European e-tailer from the brink of bankruptcy at the last minute this week is a convicted hacker turned venture capitalist, a UK newspaper reported Thursday. The Manchester Guardian reported that a German venture fund that supplied US$2.3 million to Letsbuyit this week ...

Although the Internet advertising industry has fallen victim to the belt-tightening measures of many dot-coms looking to trim their operating budgets in recent months, a report released Thursday finds the spending slump is only a "temporary pause" in the market's overall growth. According to Forres...

This week, Amazon announced that it was going to begin requiring its users to offer the company's proprietary online payment service when auctioning on the site. The move has sparked outrage among some in the Net auction community, but no doubt eBay and Yahoo! will be watching to see if the rule pay...

Kana Communications, Inc. (Nasdaq: KANA) was down $2.38 to $7.06 early Thursday, after the company reported Wednesday a wider loss for the fourth quarter ended December 31st. Analysts at several firms reportedly downgraded Kana shares following the news, with Credit Suisse First Boston and Williams...

Despite a slight dip in revenue from the previous quarter, online investment firm E*Trade (Nasdaq: EGRP) on Wednesday reported a profit from ongoing operations in the first quarter of fiscal 2001, beating analyst estimates by a penny per share. The news came as a further sign of E*Trade's ability t...

Webvan Group said Thursday that it will "dramatically reduce overhead costs" in order to conserve its cash reserves and avoid the need to return to the capital markets before the end of 2001. However, analyst David Kathman of Morningstar.com told the E-Commerce Times that he remains pessimistic a...

Last summer, when now former U.S. President Bill Clinton signed the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (E-SIGN Act), it seemed we were about to scale the next digital mountain. Despite the great fanfare that accompanied the passage of the legislation, not much has been he...

According to venture capital research firm VentureOne, there was not a single venture-backed e-commerce initial public offering (IPO) in the last three quarters of 2000. So, can the market for e-commerce IPOs possibly can get any worse? Worse than zero? Two words -- oh yes. Indeed, the e-commerce I...

The people at DoubleClick can breathe a bit easier now. With the U.S. Federal Trade Commission laying off after investigating their privacy practices for the past 11 months, the folks at DoubleClick must feel like an elephant just stepped off their chest. But the pressure hasn't gone away entirel...