Beth Cox

When it launched a year ago, Microsoft’s HomeAdvisor Technologies Inc. venture offered a software platform to automate real estate and mortgage transactions for consumers and industry professionals. Now, that part of the business may be sold off. HomeAdvisor grew into a consumer real estate operation, and the software aspects of the business apparently didn’t match […]

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s Bellevue-based venture capital company, Vulcan Ventures Inc., has bailed out of Priceline.com, selling a 6.2 percent stake in the troubled name-your-own-price company whose earnings were due out after the bell today. Analysts on average were forecasting a loss of 7 cents a share, compared with a loss of 6 cents in […]

Name-your-own price e-commerce company Priceline.com received a much-needed $50-million cash infusion today from two of the wealthiest companies in Hong Kong: Hutchison Whampoa Limited and Cheung Kong Holdings Ltd. Hutchison — an international conglomerate whose holdings include telecommunication properties, shipping assets and resort hotels — already has joined with Priceline.com in an alliance to bring […]

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s venture capital company, Vulcan Ventures Inc., has bailed out of Priceline.com, selling a 6.2 percent stake in the troubled name-your-own-price company whose earnings were due out after the bell today. Analysts on average were forecasting a loss of 7 cents a share, compared with a loss of 6 cents in the […]

Discount travel service Hotwire, in a move that makes the service more competitive with Expedia, Priceline and Travelocity, today added 19 international air carriers and rental cars via Budget and Hertz to its partner list. San Francisco-based Hotwire, backed by several major airlines, just last month began offering discount hotel rooms. It began selling discount […]

Rochester, N.Y.-based Internet research firm Harris Interactive is acquiring the Custom Research division of Norwalk, Conn.-based Yankelovich Partners in a deal valued at $7 million to $8 million. Harris said the addition is expected to generate an additional $15 million in revenue over the course of this year. The Custom Research division conducts the majority […]

Apparently unable to heal itself, San Francisco-based PlanetRx.com Inc. is exiting the retail pharmacy business and referring its 1.4 million members to rival drugstore.com. The company, with a stock price in the 50-cent range, said it plans to acquire an unspecified existing specialty pharmacy business and focus on fulfilling specialty prescriptions through its existing site. […]

Apparently unable to heal itself, San Francisco-based PlanetRx.com Inc. is exiting the retail pharmacy business and referring its 1.4 million members to rival drugstore.com . The company, with a stock price in the 50-cent range, said it plans to acquire an unspecified existing specialty pharmacy business and focus on fulfilling specialty prescriptions through its existing […]

Mountain View, Calif.-based start-up Andes Networks launched what it calls NonStop SSL, a new generation of SSL traffic management platforms that it said will provide up to 10,000 percent performance improvements over legacy architectures. The new company said its patented suite of products will enable the secure delivery of all Web content, applications and transactions, […]

San Jose, Calif.-based online auctioneer eBay Inc. reportedly is near the final stages of a deal that would expand its reach in Europe via the purchase of French auction site iBazar Group in a stock deal estimated at about $92 million. iBazar, like eBay, operates also a person-to-person online auction community. The deal would make […]

The Washington Alliance of Technology Workers says that Amazon.com has decided to give laid-off hourly customer service workers until May to decide if they want to sign separation agreements that have become somewhat controversial. The online retailer is in the process of shedding 1,300 employees, or about 15 percent of its work force, in a […]

More and more e-commerce companies are expected to begin using Internet fulfillment networks that connect them with manufacturing and distribution partners in an effort to resolve their shipping woes, says a new industry report. Indeed, an estimated 33 percent of online retailers will outsource shipping to drop shippers in the next year as they attempt […]