Inktomi Allies with Escalate, Vcommerce

Inktomi Corp. established alliances with Escalate Inc. and Vcommerce Corp. to deliver advanced
e-commerce infrastructure solutions for portals and destination sites.

The initiative will allow portals using the Inktomi (INKT) Commerce Engine to create
their own
branded stores that link directly to manufacturers, enabling lower prices for
online consumers and higher margins for portal-based commerce, the companies
said.

Financial arrangements were not disclosed.

The suites of e-commerce services offered by Escalate and Vcommerce enable
portals to source products directly from manufacturers and distributors,
without building and maintaining their own retail operations.

Outsourced services provided by Escalate and Vcommerce include manufacturer
aggregation, transaction processing, warehouse and inventory logistics, drop
shipping, and customer service.

Working with these e-commerce service
providers, Inktomi said it now can offer integrated solutions that extend
from small merchants to large branded manufacturers and portals.

Portals can select one or more product categories for branded store
offerings, and the Inktomi platform provides control over the placement and
presentation of these products in conjunction with third-party merchants.

“Inktomi is working with Escalate and Vcommerce to redefine the retail supply
chain, ultimately making commerce more profitable and powerful for portals
and destination sites,” said Stuart Spiegel, vice president and general
manager of Inktomi’s Commerce group.

Inktomi’s portal services include the search, directory, and commerce engine
applications; network products include the Traffic Server network cache
platform, Content Delivery Suite and associated value-added service
applications.