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Technology Stocks : Y2K (Year 2000) Stocks: An Investment Discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jeffrey S. Mitchell who wrote (13803)	3/9/1999 9:37:00 AM
From: MACA	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13949

Jeff you know about the article but this's for the other folks. From the Yahoo board, thanks Bodhistava. Computer World pg 29 by: Bodhistava 3202 of 3207Y2K firm sees future in enterprise portals Larger portal projects pose biggest threat By Nancy Dillon 03/08/99 If Jan. 1, 2000, comes and goes without a hitch, year 2000 computer services firms will have served their customers well. Unfortunately, they will have helped put themselves out of business in the process. But Alydaar Software Corp. has a contingency plan. Last month, the year 2000 software firm in Charlotte, N.C., changed its name to Information Architects Corp. and began to reposition itself as a consulting and services provider in the growing market for "enterprise information portals." "They have good clients and a good [year 2000] business — but looking down the road, they weren't seeing much upside for their price-to-earnings ratio," said Otto Grote, an analyst at Derby Securities Inc. in New York. Apparently, investors didn't see much upside, either. Alydaar's stock sailed as high as $19 in March of last year, but by October it was as low as $5.75. "It's the perception on the street that Y2K is driving this change," said Information Architects CEO Robert Gruder. "But the [enterprise portals] market has a lot to do with legacy integration. So it's not a big stretch for our staff. It's a natural evolution." An enterprise information portal works by taking internal company information — such as data in legacy systems, enterprise resource planning systems and client/server applications — and making it accessible as an intranet application via a Web browser. One analyst said using a corporate portal is like putting all of a company's data into a searchable Yahoo-like taxonomy. The total enterprise portal market was about $4.4 billion last year, said Julie Tylman, an analyst at Merrill Lynch & Co. in San Francisco. Tylman said those revenues could reach almost $15 billion by 2002. She said little-known companies such as Information Architects "will probably face huge challenges" as they attempt to take on large portal projects, although the market is still wide open. "In general, though, we think the big players like IBM and Oracle [Corp.] will be able to bring all the [portal] elements together a lot faster than companies without such deep pockets," Tylman said. A Possible Player Grote said he's impressed with Information Architects' progress so far. "We didn't believe the CEO when he said he was going to make the change. But he's doing it. It will be an uphill battle, but it looks to me like he's made some good acquisitions." Last month alone, the company acquired Data Systems Network Corp., a network integrator in Farmington Hills, Mich.; Tumble Interactive Media Inc., a Web-design firm in New York; and New York-based Internet service provider Way Communications.