Tokyo-based interQ, which in late August became the first independent ISP to go public on the Japanese over-the-counter (OTC) market, has announced two new Net services ventures.

On September 8, interQ joined with Kyoto-based Net-business startups United Digital and Net IRD to launch Magclick, an e-mail magazine advertising delivery service.

interQ and United Digital each hold a 40 percent stake in joint venture, while Net IRD holds the remaining 20 percent.

From early November, Magclick will begin a service to place advertisements in the e-mail magazines distributed by Magmag, Japan's largest e-zine distribution service.

Magmag, a 75:25 joint venture of United Digital and Net IRD, each month distributes 49 million copies of more than 8,850 e-zines to some 14.5 million registered readers.

This puts it well ahead of rivals Click Income (1,130 e-zines, 1.6 million registered readers) and Pubzine (1,930 e-zines, 343 thousand readers).

Magmag classifies its e-zines into 141 types in 17 categories.

"Our service will place ads based on these precisely focused categories to ensure that each advertiser reaches its target audience," said Magclick. "By the end of January 2000, we expect to be placing ads in 20 million copies of nearly 1,000 of Magmag's e-mail magazines each month."

"We will offer click-guaranteed advertising," added Magclick. "Whenever a reader clicks on an e-mail advertisement, the advertiser will pay a fee of from 110 to 140 yen (US$1.01 to $1.28), of which about 20 to 30 yen (US$0.18 to $0.27) will go to the e-mail magazine publisher."

Magclick, which reportedly is targeting first-year revenues of 360 million yen (US$3.3 million), said it expects its ad service "will further activate the world of digital/online publication."

Just two days after the Magclick announcement, on September 10, interQ added discount Internet domain name registration to its menu of services.

Through the aptly named Discount-Domain site, interQ (authorized as a commercial domain name registration agency by ICANN in April) offers ".com," ".net," and ".org" registration services in Japanese.

The company hopes to initially handle at least 300 registrations per month by discounting the industry standard registration fee of US$70 to US$67.99 for the first two years and US$35 dollars per year thereafter.

interQ has declared it will cut fees further if competitors lower their prices.

The e-zine ad sales and domain registration services announcements provided at least a momentary boost to interQ share prices.

In its first day of OTC trading, August 27, interQ debuted at 21,000 yen (US$192.66), five times its 4,200 yen (US$38.53) IPO price, ending the day at 19,000 yen (US$174.31).

interQ share prices showed little lackluster movement until September 8, the day of the Magclick announcement, when it surged by 5,700 yen (US$52.29; 26%) to close at 28,000 yen (US$256.88).

Then, buoyed by the Discount Domain service launch just two days later, interQ shares continued rising to close at 35,500 yen (US$325.69) on Monday.

Prices were on a downward trend this morning (Tuesday), however.

interQ, which began offering pay-per-call Internet access services for nonmembers in December 1995, today has 112 access points throughout Japan and a membership of more than 27,000 individuals and corporations.

The company still relies on its nonmember services for the bulk of its revenues, however: in 1998, 68 percent of revenues came from nonmembers, 24 percent from individual members, and 8 percent from corporate members.

interQ has forecast a 579 million yen (US$5.31 million) pretax profit for the current fiscal year, up by about 2.7 times from 1998, on revenues of about 3.64 billion yen (US$33.4 million).