Thanks, Smart_Money, that looks like the same event CNET reported last week. It's not surprising to see marginal e-marketplaces begin to fall by the wayside -- just like e-tailing companies going bust -- but there's no doubt it will create negative sentiment in the B2B infrastructure space. Long term, the key for companies like ARBA, ITWO, and CMRC is to secure large numbers of users; whether the users come in through dozens of small e-marketplaces or a few large ones shouldn't matter so much, except that the largest marketplaces will be able to use their leverage to negotiate better rates with the ARBAs and ITWOs than the smaller marketplaces could have. ARBA's also in a somewhat better position than CMRC because it relies less on these e-marketplaces: ARBA has had much more success selling its software directly to corporations.
This said, look at the beating ARBA is taking right now! I wrote my father-in-law last week saying I had hoped to pick up ARBA for 20-25 or even lower. I didn't really think I'd see those prices so soon, though--.
The truly ironic thing is that all the B2Bs are getting smashed today on ORCL, yet ORCL says its applications business is doing great; the weakness is in the database space. When this gets cleared up, we may see a bounce in some of the better B2Bs: worth watching ITWO, MANU, PSFT, ARTG, ARBA, and CMRC for this, I think. |
