Posted: 01/2001
News Briefs
* A sluggish market has cost 120 people their jobs, including former CEO Steve Markowitz, as MyPoints.com Inc. (www.mypoints.com) announced a workforce reduction of 29 percent last fall. Citing a shaky third quarter, its August acquisition of Cybergold and what Markowitz termed a "weak demand for Internet marketing services," the company dismissed employees in technology, production and administrative positions. MyPoints says the move eliminated redundant functions in the wake of the acquisition.
Markowitz announced his resignation on Nov. 2, saying, "I believe the company needs a chief executive experienced in taking high-growth companies to the next stage of development." He will remain as chairman through the end of the year, and as a director after that.
* Forrester Research (www.forrester.com) has ranked buy.com (www.buy.com) No. 1 in PowerRankings of online electronics sellers in November, touting the company's free shipping and fast customer service responses. Buy.com allows consumers to buy a variety of services, ranging from sporting goods to wireless products and services. Forrester's PowerRankings combines survey data from online consumers and unbiased shopping tests to provide rankings of leading U.S. e-commerce sites. Amazon.com (www.amazon.com) placed second in the ranking.
A day before Forrester released the news, buy.com announced a partnership to provide access to its website through AT&T Digital PocketNet service. AT&T Wireless Services Inc. (www.attws.com) customers with Internet-ready phones can shop on the website. Buy.com announced the introduction of its wireless product and services store in October.
* Net2Phone (www.net2phone.com) an Internet telephony carrier, has announced its e-commerce division has seen more than 30,000 websites sign up to its Click2Talk service since it was launched last June. Under the Click2Talk deal, website operators can install a simple set of HTML routines allowing users to place voice calls across the Internet. Once this is done, users can place PC-to-phone calls to a given United Kingdom or Australian phone number on demand.
