In the May issue of GSQ, you read about two companies: CommerceWAVE and ViaWeb. (See GSQ, page 13.) Well, the 21-person ViaWeb was just purchased by Yahoo for about $49 million. Yes, you read that right. Not four point nine but forty-nine million. Paul Graham, ViaWeb's president said, "It's like a little band getting a recording contract with the world's biggest record company".
With the acquisition, Yahoo can now set up virtual stores. "We get a lot of calls about easy access to distribution and e-commerce," said Ellen Siminoff, vice president of business development and strategic planning at Yahoo. "As a media company, we see this like a catalog business, a logical extension of what we're doing." Siminoff continued, "For the next two quarters, our goal is to build market share and integrate the business." The Yahoo Store is live already.
Graham and other Viaweb employees will move to Yahoo's Santa Clara, California headquarters.
On a similar note, on June 15, 1998 CommerceWave, owned by long-time industry gurus Garland Wong and Rand Pipp, merged with IXL to become IXL-CommerceWave. " This merger is an excellent growth in support for CommerceWave customers," noted Garland Wong. It will help to bring even more talent to the business of providing cutting edge web solutions."
CommerceWAVE is one of the leading suppliers of Web solutions, from their TransWAVE payment engine, to the CommerceWAVE advanced site building capabilities.
