 September 2000
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MP3.com To Go Brick-And-Mortar By Martin Stone 
Newsbytes - In a rare instance of a dot-com going brick-and-mortar,
MP3.com [NASDAQ:MPPP], the embattled online music retailer that has
been under fire from the recording industry, reportedly plans to
participate in a chain of storefront entertainment complexes.
The company said Monday it has inked an agreement with The Outernet Inc., a chain of retail outlets, that will enable consumers to go to the stores to create their own custom-made CDs, according to a report in the Toronto Globe & Mail newspaper, which noted that the CDs will feature artists and groups posting their music on MP3.com. MP3 execs said the arrangement creates an offline opportunity for digital artists to potentially increase their earnings through CD sales at a retail outlet, and that Outernet will use the MP3 technology and material to deliver the custom-made CDs to consumers. The discs will be created when buyers use interactive touch screen monitors to search the MP3.com database for songs they wish to purchase, which will then be "outloaded" to a CD burning system in each store, the newspaper said, adding that the Outernet's first location is slated to open in Apple Valley, Minn., this fall. Twenty more locations are scheduled to open by mid-2001. Asia-Pacific Overtaking Europe In E-Commerce Stakes By Steve Gold Newsbytes - Research due to be published in September suggests that the Asia- Pacific region will overtake Europe, and possibly the US, in the e-commerce stakes within the next four years. The study, from Professor Steve Burdon at Sydney's University of Technology, sees Australasia, Singapore and Korea as generating far more intensive e-commerce activity than Europe and, possibly the US, as a direct result of the current aggressive exploitation of e-commerce throughout the region at all levels. Burdon said that, when all research and trends are taken into account, e-commerce in the Asia-Pacific is set to rocket. Full details of Burdon's research, backed by data from Forrester Research and IDC, will be announced at this year's World E-Commerce Forum, which takes place in London on Oct. 18-20. The study predicts that, by 2004, six of the top seven most intensive e-commerce countries in the world will be in Asia, led by Singapore, a relatively tiny country, which currently generates high-tech exports of $65 billion a year. Burdon's report adds that India has become a major powerhouse of cost- effective software skills and has plans well under way to build a $70 billion e-commerce business with $50 billion of exports by 2008. This year's exports, his report says, will be $8 billion. In his report, the professor cites Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman, as saying that one of his major collaborations is in Hong Kong because they are the world leaders in Internet TV. Broadband Internet TV, Burdon said, is available to over 90 percent of homes and usage rates have recently broken through the 10 percent mark - the highest in the world. Japan, meanwhile, is said by the report to be the most m-commerce-savvy country in the world today. The country's iMode mobile phone system has 10 million users surfing the Web using their mobiles every day, with a further 40,000 users signing up to iMode every day. At the other end of the scale, meanwhile, is China, which has very low e-commerce activities at the moment, the report notes. However, this is set to change, as e-commerce in China will not be wholly reliant on PSTN (public switched telephone network) connections. Instead, e-commerce in China is expected to soar on the back of a surge in Internet-enabled mobile phones in the near future. The report says that, with 50 million mobile phone users already in China, the country is expected to see another 50 million users online by the end of 2001. And by 2002, Burdon's report predicts, China will have even outstripped the US in terms of total mobile phones. The World E-Commerce Forum's Web site is at http://www.worldecom.org/ An E-Marketplace For All By Michael P Bruno Washtech - Business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce concern GE Global eXchange Services (GXS) is forming a Web-based marketplace open to all industries. The Internet service, which the company calls the first of its kind, can be accessed via any Web browser. Called "Express Marketplace," the new digital marketplace "lets companies of any size, industry or location, begin immediate and low-cost supply chain collaboration, from selection through settlement, using only a Web browser," a GXS statement explained. According to Bloomberg News, Connecticut-based General Electric Co. [NYSE:GE] wouldn't say exactly how much it invested in the marketplace. The company did say that it put "hundreds of millions" of dollars into forming the GE Global eXchange unit. The new system saves companies from building their own e-trading system, as well as letting users move their internal system online easily, GXS officials said. Express Marketplace's services will include electronic request for quotation and reverse dynamic bidding; buy-side catalog access and procurement workflow; materials forecast and purchase order status tracking; and the ability to turn purchase orders into invoices, as well as routing and adjudication. More service components and functions will be introduced on an ongoing basis, said Gaithersburg, Md.-based GXS, which will own and host the marketplace. Buyers and sellers join the marketplace at no cost, though after joining, some services will be based upon an up-front or per- transaction fee, the statement said without further details. GXS said Express Marketplace, which should open in the fourth quarter, compliments standards-based transaction services, as well as supporting integration with enterprise resource planning, customer relationship management and legacy enterprise systems. GXS said it has 100,000 trading partners now part of its supply chain network. GXS said its network currently processes more than one billion B2B transactions per year, accounting for roughly $1 trillion dollars in goods and services. GXS was formed when its parent split GE Information Services in March to tap a business-to-business Internet market that Forrester Research Inc. expects to top $2.7 trillion by 2004. Pacific Internet Connects Offline Internet Users By Staff, IT Daily Singapore-based Internet service provider Pacific Internet [NASDAQ:PCNTF] is partnering with US-based Internet2Anywhere (in2a) to introduce a value-added service called WebRinger, which will allow users online to notify people who are offline using existing telephone networks. In a statement, the companies said a co-branded Web site would be hosted at the eContracts segment of its e-commerce site, Pacfusion.com, and advertising revenue would be shared equally. Users need to register at the Web site, download WebRinger software and install the program at the co-branded Web site. "Once registered, users of the WebRinger who are not connected to the Internet can receive notifications anywhere, anytime, either through a mobile phone or computer," the companies said. The service should be available in September 2000. GM Sales Venture Competes With Third-Party Sites By Martin Stone Newsbytes - General Motors Corp. [NYSE:GM] will reportedly start a new Web site this fall which will allow consumers to buy cars through its dealers directly online, and will take on the third-party auto-sales Web sites head-to-head. A Wall Street Journal report said the proposed joint venture between the automaker and its dealers is meant to address concerns that faster-moving competitors such as Autobytel (http://www.autobytel.com) and Autoweb.com (http://www.Autoweb.com) have built their businesses by linking consumers to dealers. The sites charge dealers a fee from $20 to several hundred dollars for referrals, and dealers claim they cannot afford the additional drain on an already slim profit margin. By offering finance and insurance services, the independent sites also threaten what dealers depend on as a true profit center, the report said. The GM proposal would go beyond the company's existing GM BuyPower Web site (http://www.gmbuypower.com), which offers only GM vehicles and would provide consumers with information about competitors' products and links to their dealers. The Journal noted that details of the plan remain sketchy, including issues of inventory, financing, trade-ins, and the amount each dealer would need to contribute, and the carmaker is considering several options, including purchasing various programs from existing providers, and buying a third-party site which already has clout. Siemens Plans Next Generation - Napster - Like Venture By Adam Creed Newsbytes - While music-file sharing service Napster has run into trouble because it facilitates the distribution of music against copyright owners' wishes, at least one global technology company believes the model is a good one and is looking to take it to another level ... and sell it to business. Siemens' technology incubator, Siemens Technology-To-Business Center, has today spun off a new venture called WebV2. The company is dedicated to business applications of peer-to-peer networking - the same type of system that allows Napster users to share their music over the Internet. But WebV2 is looking at commercial applications in the business-to-business arena. "This next-generation peer-to-peer approach goes well beyond simple file searching and sharing that ventures like Napster and Gnutella focus on," claimed Steve Stephansen, WebV2's new CEO. "Think B2B collaboration between peers in the supply chain, or direct knowledge exchange within enterprises." WebV2 will develop infrastructure for the commercial use of peer-to-peer networking in complex business transactions. The company has completed the architecture that these Siemens systems will be based on, composed of networked intelligent agents. The company said on Wednesday it will soon launch its first applications - "addressing distributed interactions in B2B and the extended enterprise" - and is currently talking to investors. More information about WebV2 can be found on the Web, at http://www.webv2.com/ Blockbuster, Enron Go To The Movies - Digitally By Sherman Fridman Newsbytes - Calling it the "ultimate bricks, clicks and flicks strategy," Blockbuster Inc [NYSE:BBI] today said it has entered into an exclusive, 20-year agreement with Enron Broadband Services to deliver movies on-demand. The service will be offered through the Enron Intelligent Network. Enron Broadband Services is a wholly owned subsidiary of Enron Corp. [NYSE:ENE] and Blockbuster Inc. is a publicly traded subsidiary of Viacom Inc. [NYSE:VIA and VIA.B]. According to Blockbuster and Enron, initial distribution of the movies-on-demand service will be provided by SBC Communications Inc. [NYSE:SBC], Verizon [NYSE:VZ] (formed as a result of the merger of Bell Atlantic and GTE), Qwest, Covad Communications [NASDAQ:COVD], Telus and ReFlex. These telecommunication companies will deliver the on-demand entertainment content to consumers' television sets via high-speed digital subscriber lines (DSL). Blockbuster's president of new media, Mark Gilman, told Newsbytes that both his company and Enron will identify additional distribution providers and delivery methods, including cable and satellite, to expand the reach of the entertainment on-demand service. Under the agreement, Blockbuster will provide content for the entertainment service and market it to Blockbuster's customer base of 65 million households worldwide. In addition, Blockbuster will sell DSL service through its nationwide network of stores. Gilman said that the DSL services to be sold by Blockbuster retail outlets would depend on the geographic location of the store, because DSL services rely on local "distribution providers." Enron will encode and stream the entertainment over its global broadband network, provide bandwidth on demand and store the entertainment content. Joe Hirko, CEO of Enron Broadband Services told Newsbytes that Enron's Intelligent Network is designed to allow the scalability necessary to deliver secure, high-bandwidth content to a large group of simultaneous users. Enron will also have monitoring and control responsibilities for the entertainment content. The telecommunication companies that are providing initial distribution of the service will design the architecture of the network needed to deliver a service package that would include both entertainment on-demand and high-speed Internet access. Blockbuster said in a prepared statement that for the first time, customers would be able to use their TV screens to choose from a large library of movies. Gilman said that the movies would be of "VHS-quality or better," and, as with a VCR, these DSL-delivered movies can be paused, rewound and stopped. Gilman said that the entertainment content to be offered would match the content offered at Blockbuster stores and would be available on- demand at a "slight premium" over in-store prices. "These agreements give first-mover advantage to the involved companies that should enable each of us to capture a significant share of what industry experts project will be a multi-billion annual business," said Blockbuster chairman and CEO, John Antioco, in a statement prepared to accompany today's announcement. Hirko said that there was no financial consideration paid by Enron or Blockbuster for the agreement. Asked about the possibility of a viewer copying the entertainment content, especially since it can be controlled much in the same way as a VCR recording, Hirko stressed that the content was being streamed in real-time and would not be stored on viewers' hard drives. Gilman added that the content would contain several copyright protection technologies, such as encryption and watermarking. Blockbuster and Enron say they plan to introduce the entertainment on-demand service in multiple U.S. cities by the end of 2000, and expect to extend the service to other international and American markets in 2001. More information is available from Blockbuster at http://www.blockbuster.com/ Enron maintains a Web site at http://www.enron.com/ Microsoft Plans Reorganization to Focus On the Net By Steve Gold Newsbytes. Microsoft [NASDAQ:MSFT] is working on a major shuffle of its operations to allow it to focus more on Internet strategies and business, news reports said. Today's Wall Street Journal (WSJ) notes that the shuffle will be the software giant's third in 18 months, but will create a new division to oversee the Microsoft.NET initiative, which was announced in June. The WSJ said that the restructuring was announced to Microsoft staffers in a company-wide e-mail on Aug. 9, in which Steve Ballmer, the firm's CEO, said that just as the Windows platform has powered the growth of the PC industry over the past 20 years, the firm is now well-positioned to create software and services that will power tomorrow's Internet and take advantage of significant opportunities in wireless, new devices, small business, games and TV. Although Microsoft UK & Europe is making a firm no comment on the WSJ article, sources said that the software giant's application service provider (ASP) project, which has been on extensive trial since the beginning of the year, has been a success. The ASP project, which revolves around offering Microsoft applications "for rent" across the Internet, running on remote servers, has been launched on both sides of the Atlantic by a number of ASPs. Originally announced in February under the Applications2GO banner (http://www.applications2go.com ), Microsoft has been working with Compaq and Esoft Global on the rentware initiative. Currently, Microsoft said, many organizations purchase a license for their software, which they then install on a group of machines within their offices. In the future, the software giant predicts, organizations will move to a software rental model, paying a set amount of money for rental and support of a package on a per-user, per-month basis. Under Applications2GO, rentware can be installed on either a LAN or WAN basis, embracing the Internet where possible, with organizations electing to run their applications on a remote server - hosted by a third-party company - using Internet slave terminals on user's desks. Microsoft has been experimenting with this concept for Internet access to Windows 2000 applications on its Web site, but the plan with Compaq and Esoft goes much further, moving all three partners firmly into the ASP marketplace. The consortium said that at the heart of the Applications2GO strategy is the ASP model, which the companies define as the concept of delivering application software over the Internet as a service rather than as a product. The companies said that for customers of business software, ASP will bring about two major changes: firstly, in the way applications are deployed and supported, and, secondly, in the way software is financed. Typically, for example, applications will be charged on a price per user per month basis - effectively a rental payment. The benefits to businesses include guaranteed service level agreements (SLAs), improved cash-flow through reduced capital outlay, reduced time-to-application benefits and application plus software upgrade flexibility. The Applications2GO companies said that as the ASP market evolves, RentWare will make it possible for large and small organizations alike to deploy low volumes of sophisticated applications that would previously have been unobtainable due to the high initial outlay and software license costs. Against this backdrop, the firms said, software developers will see an increase in the size of their potential customer base. Compaq's plan is to offer its hardware for the RentWare services to run on, while Microsoft is planning to diversify away from its traditional operating system and license-based applications software base over to the RentWare platform. Esoft Global, meanwhile, is billed as Europe's first Internet ASP and, as such, will act as the "glue" to hold the services together. Microsoft's Web site is at http://www.microsoft.com/ |