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Microcap & Penny Stocks : Tokyo Joe's Cafe / Societe Anonyme/No Pennies -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TokyoMex who wrote (44231)	1/17/1999 5:57:00 PM
From: puborectalis	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 119973

Associated Press, 01/17/99 17:31 WALTHAM, Mass. (AP) - What a difference a year can make - especially if you're an Internet company. One year ago, Lycos Inc. was considered an on-line weakling, with only about 20 percent of Web users visiting its Website index and its stock price hovering around $17 a share. Since then, Lycos has transformed itself into what analysts consider a close No. 2 to Yahoo. In November, 45 percent of Web users passed through Lycos, and on Friday its stock closed over $87 per share. That stock run-up gave the company - which had net sales of $56 million in fiscal 1998 - a stock market value of $3.8 billion. The secret to Lycos' success? Unlike many Internet companies, it has shown it's ability to make a profit. The company first turned a profit in October 1997 and was in the black for the first half of its 1998 fiscal year, which ended July 31. Since then, an acquisition spree has cost the Internet search service $112 million in losses. Analysts, however, are optimistic about the company's moneymaking prospects. The company started in June 1994, when Lycos search engine technology was invented at Carnegie Mellon University. A year later, Carnegie Mellon licensed the technology and set up Lycos as a business. The company's first big growth spurt came with its $61 million acquisition in February of Tripod, an Internet site aimed at 20-somethings in college or starting their careers. The site was launched by Bo Peabody, a Williams College student, and Richard Sabot, his economics professor. Peabody became a vice president and Sabot a board member of Lycos. Lycos then bought WhoWhere, an Internet ''white pages'' service, for $133 million, followed by its $83 million purchase of the on-line assets of Wired magazine. Those included the HotBot search engine, Wired magazine's Web site and the satirical Web magazine Suck. ''We decided the best way to catch Yahoo was to pursue a network of branded sites, rather than one megasite,'' Peabody told The Boston Globe. Unlike its competitors, Lycos's different Internet services are each targeted to a specific market. Each Lycos property is linked to other Lycos properties. ''This is the whole point about multiple brands,'' said Peabody. ''We don't care if we lose the user if they come to some place we own.'' Lycos revenue comes from on-line advertising, and deals with partners like BarnesandNoble.com., Barnes and Noble's on-line bookseller. BarnesandNoble.com will offer to sell a book on any topic searched by Web surfers using Lycos, and its ads are all over other Lycos sites. ''Lycos is more than an Internet play,'' said Carl Rosendorf, a vice president of marketing at BarnesandNoble.com. ''Lycos is a savvy media company ... I think they're some of the smartest people on the Web.'' For the future, Lycos wants to generate revenue from selling goods through its own on-line store. The Lycos Store opened in December, featuring about 4,000 specialty items from companies such as Wine Enthusiast, Pier 1 Imports, Sharper Image and Floris of London. Its biggest worry now is that its growth will be constricted by a lack of talented workers. ''Massachusetts doesn't have the base that Silicon Valley does in Web companies,'' said Bob Davis, Lycos' chief executive. ''As a result, we have a smaller talent pool.'' -