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Rogers Communications Inc., Canada's largest cable company, and Excite Inc. said on Monday they plan a C$30-million joint venture to build a new Canadian Web site.

Toronto-based Rogers and Redwood, California-based Excite agreed to each contribute C$15 million for a new Canadian "portal," or point of entry for Canadian Internet surfers.

Excite boasts 16 million monthly customers at its flagship sites excite.com and webcrawler.com. Rogers has 2.3-million cable subscribers, mainly in the key markets of Toronto and Vancouver and offers high-speed Internet access through a tie-up with California-based Internet service provider At Home Corp. .

"This combination allows us to build a Canadian content solution that has the potential to take a leading position in the growing Canadian Internet advertising market," said Brian Segal, president and chief executive of Maclean Hunter Publishing, responsible for Rogers interactive media unit. .

Excite plans a Web site that offers free e-mail, Canadian news, weather and financial information along with sports, entertainment and music.

The joint venture comes five days after another of Rogers' partners, California-based @ Home Corp. and Excite were cleared last Wednesday by the U.S. government to proceed with their merger.