Beth Cox

German media giant Bertelsmann AG will sell its Internet comparison shopping unit Evenbetter.com to U.S.-based DealTime, also a comparison-shopping service, and will form a joint venture with DealTime in Europe in a transaction valued at about $100 million. As part of the agreement, Bertelsmann will also take a stake in DealTime ‘s parent company, DealTime […]

IBM Corp. this week signed a deal to begin re-marketing the Keynote Systems Perspective service for Web site performance measurement to its e-business and hosting customers throughout North America. IBM has been using Keynote’s service for its own Web site since 1996, and it is currently using the service to optimize the Web site for […]

American online consumers in 2005 will spend an estimated $632 billion in off-line channels as a direct result of research that they conduct on the Web, says a new report. That figure dwarfs the estimated $199 billion that consumers will spend on the Internet, says the report. Businesses that doubt the importance of the Internet […]

FamilyMeds.com signed a deal to co-branded English- and Spanish-language online pharmacies for Ames Department Stores Inc. as part of FamilyMeds.com’s ongoing B2B initiative. Ames is a large regional discount retailer with 460 stores in 19 states and the District of Columbia and annual sales of $4 billion. The new Web site, Amesmeds.com, will be operational […]

B2B catalog content solutions provider Cardonet debuted version 2.0 of its catalog aggregation product, Cardonet MarketStand Suite. The new version simplifies the process of supplier product classification, reducing the resources required for creating and managing transactive e-marketplace catalogs. Transforming supplier product information into the classification structure used by the e-marketplace is a key part of […]

Hallmark Cards Inc. will acquire privately-held Gift Certificate Center Co. (GCC), one of the top gift certificate providers in the United States. The sale will be finalized May 31, pending shareholder approval; financial terms were not disclosed. Founded in 1990 by a group of private investors, GCC was one of the first businesses to provide […]

Mother’s Day was an e-tailer’s dream as shoppers went online in droves and spent an estimated $190 million on everything from cards and flowers to books and videos. That compared to a paltry $14 million in estimated sales for Mother’s Day 1999, according to merchant rating and marketplace site BizRate.com. In fact, the estimated final […]

B2B Net market maker VerticalNet Inc. said it is partnering with CyberSource Corp. to deliver a suite of e-commerce services across VerticalNet’s 56 different industry-specific communities. CyberSource will become VerticalNet’s provider for services that include credit card clearance, and VerticalNet will offer CyberSource’s Payment, Tax and Risk Management Services to businesses in its trading communities. […]

America Online subsidiary Netscape Communications signed with The FORTUNE Group to provide users of the Netscape Netcenter service direct access to a selection of FORTUNE’s business news, columns and features. FORTUNE Group, publisher of business magazines FORTUNE, FSB: FORTUNE Small Business and eCompany Now, is a subsidiary of Time-Warner, which is being acquired by AOL. […]

Internet shopping infomediary inshop.com and Vindigo, a developer of personal navigation applications for hand-held devices, are teaming up to bring inshop’s local store listings to Vindigo users. Vindigo’s free mobile service for Palm Inc. and Palm-compatible hand-held devices provides users with local content about where to eat, shop and play whenever they may be. In […]

Auction and e-commerce site uBid.com made a move into the B2B market by teaming up with TechSmart.com, signing a three-year deal whereby TechSmart.com will provide uBid.com users with an online marketplace to purchase surplus digital business assets. TechSmart.com is a B2B marketplace for surplus technology asset recovery and IT services. The new marketplace at uBid.com […]

Three of the big names in the auto and collision industries launched ChoiceParts LLC, a new company that will provide auto retailers and collision repair facilities access to a virtual warehouse of auto parts. When it launches later this summer, ChoiceParts, to be based in Denver, will serve as an electronic auto parts marketplace linking […]