ShopNow.com Continues Shopping Spree

Chalking up its second acquisition in as many days, e-commerce player ShopNow.com Inc. did some shopping of its own Tuesday, buying business-to-business trading company Ubarter.com Inc., a business-to-business
barter firm, for about $45 million in stock.

ShopNow (SPNW) will
expand into the B2B space with the purchase, the company said. Ubarter.com
(UBTR)
oversees the transaction process for businesses by managing sales of
business assets, excess inventory, surplus production, or services for other
needed products and services. The acquisition is expected to close in the
next few months.

Dwayne Walker, chairman and chief executive officer of ShopNow.com, said
expanding its business customer base is a smart move for the company.

“Over 80 percent of the revenues for ShopNow.com now come from businesses,”
he said. The
proposed acquisition of a business exchange like Ubarter.com
will allow us to grow our business-to-business revenues more rapidly.”

“We will continue to aggressively expand our offerings to our
business and merchant partners and take a leadership role in providing all
the services and products needed to successfully transact
commerce on the Web.”

Tuesday’s acquisition is one of a series of moves made by ShopNow to boost
its business services. On Monday, the company bought bargain-shopping site Bottomdollar.com for $50 million in stock.

In October, the ShopNow took a minority stake in escrow.com, a developer of e-commerce
processing and fulfillment for online auctions, business-to-business sites
and business-to-consumer sites. The company has also partnered with online
firms such as sixdegrees.com and About.com.

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