The News — 9/24/00
One-Third of Business Say E-Commerce Will Transform
The majority of companies in a KPMG International global study see the Internet having a profound effect on the role they play in their industries – with nearly one-third expecting to see e-business changing their core businesses, according to the professional services organization. Full Story
Microsoft Enhances bCentral
Microsoft today introduced "Business Web Services ," a collection of hosted Web tools, email, e-commerce and marketing applications that will be available on the software giant’s bCentral small-business service. The service, which will be available later this year, will cost businesses $24.95 per month.
One London resident, James Stevens, wants to wirelessly network all of London by using relatively cheap, off-the-shelf parts . With the help of dozens of volunteers, Stevens is hoping to create a city-wide wireless network, built and maintained by the users themselves. Unlike the commercial wireless networks, Stevens’ Consume the Net network will offer free access to anyone with a computer and a US$100 wireless networking card.
Wireless Internet access provider Metricom today launched a broad offensive to boost adoption of its service for mobile PC customers. Metricom has debuted its speedier service in six new cities: Baltimore, Dallas, Houston, Philadelphia, Phoenix and New York. The slower original version was available only in San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C., with service recently launched in Atlanta and San Diego as well. All cities now receive the faster service. The newer service, also called Ricochet, delivers Internet content to PC customers at 128 kbps , comparable to an ISDN connection and several times faster than dial-up modems or the original Ricochet offering, which is only capable of 28.8-kbps downloads.
" Consumers don’t think they want the wireless Web yet, but they will ." So said Forrester analyst Patrick Callinan, explaining his firm’s recent conclusion that there is "latent demand" for Internet-enabled mobile phones in the United States. The study that uncovered the latent demand also pointed out that respondents from 34 percent of households surveyed said it was unlikely they would buy any cellular devices, and two-thirds of North American consumers said they were reluctant to make purchases using Internet cell phones.
Shakeout Looming in B2B Communities?
This is a good round-up article from ClickZ about the opportunities and threats facing B2B communities and exchanges. It’s packed with stats and references as well as questions you should ask about participating in an online exchange or community.
"B2B communities are places where businesses sometimes engage in e-commerce, but that’s not their primary goal. Exchanges or online marketplaces, on the other hand, are established specifically to conduct e-commerce. They bring together buyers and sellers, offering procurement services that feature consolidated purchasing from numerous partner vendors, e-malls, or bidding/auction-oriented sites. Is a shakeout looming for these types of web properties?" Full Article
1 Million Businesses on DSL in 3 Years? Sounds light to me
This prediction seems way too conservative to me. According to eMarketer, "More than 1 million U.S. businesses will turn to xDSL technologies for broadband internet access within the next 3 years, according to eMarketer’s eCommerce: B2B Report. During the same period, the number of businesses accessing the internet will rise from 4.5 million by year-end 2000 to over 6.7 million by 2003.
"Currently, less than 10% of business users connect to the internet using xDSL, but by 2003, eMarketer expects that business xDSL subscribers will rise to more than 16% of the business access market. A study by the Strategis Group found that 57% of U.S. firms access the internet via dial-up connections at speeds of only 56 kilobits per second. The vast majority of these companies are small businesses, with less than 100 employees.
"As e-commerce activity increases, many small businesses will be upgrading to faster access speeds in order to accommodate the greater demand for bandwidth," says eMarketer’s Senior Business Analyst, Steve Butler. "Research has found that the use of application service providers (ASP’s) will be a significant driver of broadband adoption as well."
"xDSL will be the preferred access technology chosen by small businesses due to its low cost compared to fiber. Furthermore, xDSL technologies offer better security than cable," added Butler.
"For more on the report, click here ."
Preparing for the B2B Battle
Gulf War veteran and FreeMarkets founder/CEO Glen T. Meakem is trying to stave off competitor VerticalNet and survive in the perilous online marketplace sector. Business Week
Wireless Web wave breaks over the IPO market
Wireless is hot for VCs too. This article focuses on the wireless providers for devices such as palm and Blackberry. Red Herring
The Great Thing About Standards: There are so many of them!
There’s a new XML format in town: RSS 1.0. Co-founder and Chief Architect David Galbraith of Moreover.com is co-author of RSS 1.0, which has become the de facto standard for web-based syndication. This new version of RSS promises to make simple web syndication rival existing heavyweight standards. Through the use of modules, it will allow different parties to extend the core spec. to produce components describing data specific to a particular use or industry. It is a significant step towards inventor of the web Tim Berners Lee’s vision for the ‘semantic web’: one vast database of information. Check it out at Moreover
Business guru Tom Peters sees major e-commerce shakeout
OK, I think Tom Peters is great. But after seeing him speak at a Delphi conference in May, I don’t think he knows a thing about B2B e-commerce. Here he holds forth about that topic and says over 85 percent of e-commerce-based companies will bite the big one. He may be right about that, and I sure like this quote: "E-commerce is not a technology play, it’s a relationship, partnering, communication, and organizational play, made possible by technology." More
The News — 9/28/00
Rocket Cars That Go Splat, Involuntary Kidney Donations, and Other Net Myths
Don’t believe everything you read, and especially, don’t believe everything you see in your email box. I’ve spent many hours over my career trying to extinguish various types of net myths, which take on a life of their own as well-meaning colleagues forward them endlessly and clog up the corporate email system. In fact, for years, my particular pet peeve was the notion that you could harm your computer by reading an email. For years, this was not true. Sadly, reality caught up with myth, and today, email really can eat your computer. This article points to a number of excellent sites you can go to to find out if that juicy rumor is really true.
LA Times
Oracle B2B Not So Hot
Larry Ellison has vowed to smash B2B competitors like Ariba and Commerce One. This article says it hasn’t happened yet; will it ever? Oracle claims to be powering 55 online trading exchanges, including eight industry consortium exchanges. But their own exchange, Oracle Exchange, is a joke.
Upside
Dinosaurs Can Dance
One of the original exchanges, the Chicago Board Options Exchange, is getting on the Web, licensing Primex Trading’s online auction software. There’s life in the old girl yet.
News Release
