Software developer Inktomi Thursday launched its online
shopping service for European Internet portals.
The move will make the Inktomi Shopping Engine available
to many of the top portals for integration into
their sites.
Recently, BT announced that it would be the
first to use the Inktomi Shopping Engine for
powering its web-based
btspree.com
service. Now, other portals can benefit from
the same technology.
“Inktomi is in a unique position as the software
infrastructure leader for the Internet providing
private-label portal services to major portal and
destination sites worldwide,” said David Peterschmidt,
president and CEO of Inktomi.
“The addition of our Shopping Engine will provide
European portals with commerce capabilities and
an innovative new service to offer their customers.”
Inktomi’s Web searching technology is built into
its Shopping Engine, enabling users to search the
Internet quickly for many different products. The
engine compares prices and features, and is designed
to scale with the growth of the Internet.
According to research firm
Jupiter Communications,
consumer online shopping in Western Europe will be
EUR 18.6 billion ($20 billion) in 2003. At present,
the core markets of the UK, France and Germany account
for 65 per cent of online sales.
