04/13 16:28 Beyond.com Refutes Forrester Statements That It has Closed Its
Doors <BYND.O>
Beyond.com Refutes Forrester Statements That It has Closed Its Doors to Consumers
SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 13, 2000-- Beyond.com's Web Store Receives More Than One Million Unique Visitors in February, Highest of Any Non-Auction Consumer Electronics Site
E-commerce services provider Beyond.com(TM) (Nasdaq:BYND) said today that statements relating to the company in a Forrester Research Inc. report issued on April 11, 2000, claiming that the company has closed its doors to consumers, are completely inaccurate. Forrester has said it will correct the inaccurate statement about Beyond.com.
Beyond.com's Interim CEO Rick Neely said the company's Web store, which sells software and computer related products to consumers and small corporate customers, is alive and well. Furthermore, the company had $66 million in cash at the end of Q4 1999, which independent auditors Ernst & Young LLP stated in the company's 1999 10-K, is sufficient funds for at least 12 months.
The company's Web store, located at www.beyond.com, was rated the second most-visited consumer electronics site on the Web, as determined by Nielsen/NetRatings for the month of February. The Beyond.com store had a unique audience of 1,115,731 visitors in February, the highest of any non-auction consumer electronics site.
Beyond.com attributes much of the traffic to high customer loyalty. The company's affiliates program, with more than 75,000 members, is also a key driver of traffic to the site. The Nielsen/NetRatings report noted that, "Companies that started selling consumer electronics online early continue to have a distinct advantage over those that came online later...Beyond.com also got in early and enjoys home-based traffic of more than one million unique visitors per month."
In January 2000 the company announced that it was restructuring in order to strengthen its focus on the business-to-business (B2B) market. The company is building on the strength of its eStore Group, which builds and manages Web stores for businesses, and Government Systems Group, which provides e-commerce software solutions to government agencies.
"We still sell software and computer related products to consumers and small businesses via the Beyond.com Web store, but as we stated in January, we will not spend significant advertising dollars to attract new customers to the site as we have done in the past," Neely said. "Instead, we plan to expand our existing customer base through our affiliates and direct email programs, while leveraging our website to help promote and grow our eStore and Government Systems Groups.
"We consider the Beyond.com Web store to be the company's flagship eStore," Neely said. "As we grow our eStore business, we are leveraging our expertise in site design and management to build and run eStores for software developers, hardware manufacturers and systems OEMs."
About Beyond.com
Beyond.com is an e-commerce services provider that builds and manages Web stores for businesses and sells software and computer related products to the government, corporate and consumer markets. The company's eStore division allows software publishers, hardware manufacturers and systems OEMs to launch a full-featured e-commerce store in a few weeks. Businesses can choose from an array of offerings, including website design and construction, transaction processing, physical and electronic order fulfillment, customer support, marketing, and merchandising support and reporting. Customers include CADopia.com, Compaq Computer, Executive Software, IntelliGolf, McAfee.com, Palm Computing, SalesLogix, Symantec, Systran Software, Telex and Trend Micro. Beyond.com's government division provides digitally downloadable software and related services to a growing list of government agencies, including the Department of Treasury, Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) and Patent and Trademark Office (PTO), a division of the Department of Commerce. Beyond.com also operates its own online store beyond.com, where customers can find an expansive selection of software and computer related products. Beyond.com Corporation trades on the Nasdaq National Market under the symbol ("BYND"). More information on the company can be found in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"). |
