Alley Cat News, a monthly magazine about the Silicon Alley business scene, is moving to a bi-monthly publication schedule and postponing its conferences for the rest of the year. A soft outlook for advertising and marketing revenues prompted the changes.

Anna Copeland Wheatley, editor-in-chief of the magazine, told atNewYork that two staffers with the publication were let go as a result of the cutbacks. Going forward, the publication will appear every two months, such as May-June, July-August and September-October.

The magazine, published by AlleyCat Information Sciences, Inc., said its May 9th event, The Women of Silicon Alley Venture Fair, and its CFO Summit 2001 set for June, were being postponed, most likely until fall or early next year.

With a majority of corporate marketing budgets cut for the year if not scaled back aggressively in the face of a slowing economy, conferences that rely on five-figure corporate sponsorships and marketing deals have had to scale back as well.

Wheatley said the AlleyCat conference and publishing schedule decisions are no different than those faced by other conferences that have found few takers for corporate sponsorships. She said the likelihood is that conference planning will resume in the fall when corporate marketing budgets are expected to improve.

AlleyCat Information Sciences also sponsors the annual "Alley to the Valley" venture capital summt, which was held in San Francisco in February.