>>what do you think...<<
Prissey, I know you didn't ask me but, this is what I think.
Don't fight this PR machine.
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SEOUL, March 19 (Reuters) - South Korea's Samsung Corp said on Friday it has agreed to form an alliance with the world's leading Internet book retailer Amazon.com Inc.
A spokesman for the Samsung Group 1/8SAGR.CN 3/8 unit said the two companies were due to sign a memorandum of understanding on March 24 in Seoul on the cooperation pact.
Under the alliance, Samsung would operate its own site to sell products on the local market on behalf of Amazon, thereby having the new site act as a local agent, he said.
But he said detailed fields and types of cooperation would be decided later after more talks between the two companies.
Samsung Corp's main business sector is foreign trading, wholesale and retail marketing but sometimes pioneers the Samsung Group's international joint ventures.
20:50 03-18-99 <<
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PALO ALTO, Calif., March 18 (Reuters) - The online drug store PlanetRx opened for business on Thursday, offering consumers another place on the Internet to buy everything from vitamins to cosmetics to prescription drugs.
PlanetRx, based in South San Francisco, makes its debut less than a month after the launch of drugstore.com, the Seattle-based cyberstore in which Amazon.com Inc <AMZN.O> owns a 46 percent stake.
"I think we set a record," said PlanetRx Chairman Bill Razzouk, referring to the launch of the site, just six months after the business received funding.
He said the site was designed to integrate content, community and commerce to help consumers make decisions about the drug and health care products they use. Visitors can accessa drug library for information about dosing and side effects, send electronic mail with more specific queries to a staff pharmacist, and browse from an extensive range of products from nail polish to soap to cleansing strips.
Like drugstore.com, PlanetRx has been licensed to sell drugs in all 50 states, and is marketing itself as a convenient and more private alternative to the corner drug store.
And like Peter Neupert, the former Microsoft Corp. <MSFT.O> vice president who heads drugstore.com, PlanetRx's Razzouk is a former chief operating officer at FDX Corp.'s <FDX.N> Federal Express and is viewed as a formidable competitor in the high-tech industry.
Both companies were also backed by prominent Silicon Valley venture capital firms.
Still Razzouk discourages parallels to the heated rivalry between online book sellers.
"Is this going to be another Amazon/Barnesandnoble type battle? No, I don't think so," he said, noting the average U.S. consumer buys between $80 to $100 worth of books a year, but spends $450 on over-the-counter drugs alone.
"Drugs is a huge market, and I don't think any one company is going to dominate it. This is a $230 billion-a-year market."
18:42 03-18-99
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>>Stamford, Connecticut, March 18 (Bloomberg) -- Thomson Corp.'s college-textbook publishing unit plans to start charging its distributors the same rate to ensure online retailers don't have an unfair edge over college book shops.
International Thomson Publishing, or ITP, the second-largest publisher of college textbooks in the U.S., said all online retailers, distributors and college bookstores will pay the same price for its books. Thomson, as well as most publishers in the $2 billion U.S. college-textbook industry, typically give discounts to big distributors.
The unprecedented move comes in response to an increasing number of students buying books from online retailers such as Amazon.com Inc. that can charge lower prices because they buy from distributors that get discounts. Publishers generally sell textbooks directly to college bookstores.
''We used to have this nicely ordered world where college stores were the only places selling books to students,'' said Ron Dunn, head of ITP's higher education and international group. Online sellers are ''putting some bookstores at a disadvantage.''
Stamford, Connecticut-based ITP said it doesn't know whether the lack of discounts will result in reduced sales of textbooks.
Sales to big distributors make up a ''small'' percentage of ITP's total sales, said Dunn, who declined to be more specific.
ITP is exploring its own Internet strategy and may someday sell books online directly to distributors, Dunn said.
''If that's what our customers want -- we'll do it,'' Dunn said.
The pricing-disparity problem began about a year ago and accelerated over the past eight months, ITP said.
Many online sites selling college textbooks recently have cropped up, including bigwords.com, varsitybooks.com and textbooks.com, which is part of Barnes & Noble Inc.'s online retail site.
Shares of Toronto-based Thomson Corp. fell C$0.80 to C$37.70.
18:03:52 03/18/1999
For more stories from Bloomberg News, click here.
(C) Copyright 1999 Bloomberg L.P.
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NEW YORK, March 18 (Reuters) - Barnes & Noble Inc. <BKS.N>, the No. 1 U.S. bookstore chain, and German media giant Bertelsmann AG <BTGGg.F> on Thursday registered for an initial public offering of 15 to 20 percent of their online joint venture, barnesandnoble.com.
In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, barnesandnoble.com said it would offer stock valued at up to $200 million and use the proceeds to build its business.
"barnesandnoble.com could be the biggest IPO for 1999...and maybe for the end of the millennium," said David Menlow of IPO Financial Network.
Barnes & Noble shares rose as much as $6.13, to $35, in trade on the New York Stock Exchange following the announcement.
Barnes & Noble and Bertelsmann each own half of the online bookseller. The IPO was previously delayed after Bertelsmann agreed in October to buy half of the venture for $200 million. The companies will maintain equal ownership after the IPO, a barnesandnoble.com spokesman said.
The chief competitor to barnesandnoble.com is Amazon.com <AMZN.O>, the giant online retailer of books, music and videos. barnesandnoble.com opened in March 1997, after Amazon, and unlike Amazon, has ties to a traditional bookseller.
Since opening it has sold products to 1.5 million customers in 181 countries, according to the SEC filing, but trails Amazon in its customer base.
"Amazon has a huge head start," said William Armstrong, an analyst with Fahnestock & Co. "They have the infrastructure, they have the name, it's just a matter of getting people to visit their site," he said of barnesandnoble.com.
The biggest benefit to the deal, analysts said, may be to create a liquid market for barnesandnoble.com shares, which will be reflected in the stock prices of the company's owners.
"I think the feeling has been in the past that Barnes & Noble Inc. has been undervalued compared with what Amazon is getting," Armstrong said.
The site had $61.8 million in sales in 1998 but lost $83.1 million during the year. In addition, it had negative cash flow, unlike Amazon, which despite bottom-line losses has cash flow growth.
Internet retailers frequently lose money as they spend to increase their reach, and barnesandnoble.com said it is spending heavily on advertising and development.
The site currently has promotional partnerships with America Online Inc. <AOL.N>, Lycos Inc. <LCOS.O> and Microsoft Corp. <MSFT.O>, and makes payments to strategic partners.
Leonard Riggio, the chairman and chief executive of Barnes & Noble, will be chairman of the online venture, and Bertelsmann executive Jonathan Bulkeley will be CEO.
The lead underwriters for the offering are Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch. Salomon Smith Barney and Wit Capital, an investment banker that pioneered taking companies public via the Internet, were also listed as underwriters.
barnesandnoble.com Class A common shares will list on the Nasdaq stock market under the symbol "BNBN," the companies said.
17:43 03-18-99 <<
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REDMOND, Wash., March 18 (Reuters) - Online pharmacy Drugstore.com on Thursday launched a marketing deal that promotes it on select Excite <XCIT.O> areas of Netscape Communications Corp.'s <NSCP.O> Netcenter Internet service.
Under the deal, closely held Drugstore.com, in which online retailer Amazon.com Inc. <AMZN.O> has a 40 percent stake, will have links to its site from shopping, health and other Excite Inc. pages on Netcenter.
Visitors to the Excite pages will be able to access and purchase drugstore.com's products by clicking on the firm's links and advertisements.
Drugstore.com's agreement with Excite and Netscape follows similar deals with other Internet heavyweights.
The Redmond, Wash. offers prescription and over-the-counter drugs and a host of other healthcare products over the Web.
10:44 03-18-99 <<
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NEW YORK, March 18 (Reuters) - Salomon Smith Barney said Thursday it started coverage of Amazon.com Inc. with a buy rating.
Price target is $175 a share.
Shares rose 8 to 139.
Is that enough for 1 day??
Happy, says we focus too much on the "Thing"!
With all the PR. How can you miss it?? |
