Thor Olavsrud

Banking on e-commerce businesses’ attraction to the ability to instantly communicate with customers, open source e-commerce solutions provider Zelerate Inc. (formerly OpenSales Inc.) Monday struck a strategic alliance and referral agreement with up-and-coming open source instant messaging technology provider Jabber.com Inc., a subsidiary of Webb Interactive Services Inc. Under the terms of the agreement, Zelerate […]

In a story that’s becoming all too common for Silicon Alley start-up SPACE.com, the space multimedia company Friday unveiled a management reorganization. The latest reorganization has John C. Ferrara, chief financial officer of the company, moving up to chief operating officer and succeeding Mitchell Cannold who held the post for more than a year. The […]

Bellevue-based Mercata Inc. an e-tailer with the backing of technology industry heavy Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, pulled a $100 million IPO Wednesday citing poor market conditions. In a Jan. 2 letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company — which had been set to go public on March 9 under the symbol MCTA […]

As a sign that the industrywide problems can’t be cured with a simple interest rate cut, DSL providers Planet Systems Network (PSN) and Jato Communications have joined the rolls of ISPs shutting down operations. PSN is working to transition its customers to new service providers. Customers using NorthPoint Residential DSL are being transitioned to Telocity. […]

Terra Lycos Wednesday moved to expand its Lycos Anywhere initiative with the launch of a Spanish and English WAP portal at http://wap.terra.com. The portal is a sister to the company’s English language WAP portal http://wap.lycos.com, launched earlier this year. The company said the portal is the first to offer wireless users email, search, directory, news, […]

Despite a $117.6 million IPO in 1999, embattled music site Musicmaker.com neared the end of its road Wednesday as the Board of Directors of the New York-based company, which enables custom CD compilation and digital downloads, voted unanimously to liquidate and dissolve the company. The move comes nearly a month after music industry heavyweight EMI […]

Say so-long to the Sock Puppet. Pets.com Inc., the high-profile online pet products retailer, Tuesday announced it will hold a special stockholders meeting on Jan. 16 to ratify the company’s plan for complete liquidation and dissolution. Stockholders will also vote on changing the company’s name to IPET Holdings Inc. The company said it has already […]

Popular portal iWon, looking to increase its stickiness by incorporating instant messaging, Tuesday licensed Jabber.com Inc.’s open source technology. iWon, the fifth most trafficked site on the Internet according to Nielsen/NetRatings’ Nov. 2000 survey, will utilize Jabber Instant Messaging server technology, professional services, support and maintenance to extend instant messaging capabilities and notification services to […]

The crumbling “name-your-own-price” empire founded by Jay Walker will be looking for a new director come Sunday. priceline.com Inc. said late Thursday that Walker, vice chairman of the company’s board, will resign on Dec. 31 to focus his attention on Walker Digital LLC, a think tank he created in 1995. priceline.com’s name-your-own-price business model was […]

Amid the dearth of activity during the slow holiday week, F5 Networks Inc.’s announcement sticks out like a sore thumb. The provider of Internet traffic and content management services Thursday warned Wall Street that its revenue and earnings for its first quarter, ending Dec. 31, would fall well short of expectations due to weakness in […]

For the first time, ad-supported ISP NetZero Inc. — the self-proclaimed “Defenders of the Free World” — plans to charge patrons of its Internet access service, but only those users who exceed a threshold of 40 hours online in a single calendar month. In an effort to reign in costs associated with what it calls […]

Internet retailer Egghead.com — which sells software and related products to small- and medium-sized businesses — Friday revealed a hacker had penetrated its computer systems and may have accessed its customer databases. Sources inside the credit card industry have reportedly said that as many as 3.7 million card numbers may have been stolen. Egghead.com has […]