31 Dec 1999 Millennium Madness: eBay takes no chances with Y2K bug

Energis has dipped its toe into German waters with the £4.7 million in cash acquisition of BusinessOnline, a teeny-weeny Berlin-based ISP. from venture capitalists and management. The top three managers retain 25 per cent in the company. BusinessOnline` turned over £1 million for the ten months to October.

eBay is indulging in a bit of vertical integration with the acquisition of one of its software suppliers. Blackthorne Software is described as a "leading provider of software that automates the management of listings for eBay's sellers" Its products include AuctionAssistant which "helps sellers format and post their merchandise on eBay, as well as integrating email and invoicing functions".

Sainsbury's could be opening a branch of its bank on the Internet, according

today.

Affinity Internet Holdings has acquired a stake in eRecruitments Limited which would give it up to a 20 per cent in the jobs Web site. Details of the deal were not released.

eXchange Holdings has reached agreement with Yahoo! UK Ltd to provide a range of comparative personal financial information services on co-branded pages within Yahoo! UK & Ireland Finance. The financial information services is due to go live Q1 2000.

Ladbrokes International has opted for UK-based Orbis to provide the technology for its new integrated Internet and telephone betting operation in Gibraltar. Ladbrokes.com site will go live in Q1 2000.

BSkyB is to acquire a ten per cent stake in British computer games portal and community, gameplay.com. Gameplay will issue new shares to BSkyB. Under a separate agreement, Gameplay has also entered into a strategic alliance with BSkyB, to become the computer and/or video games e-commerce partner across BSkyB's online properties. Gameplay has also committed to develop a 13-episode weekly series of computer and video games television shows for broadcast exclusively by BSkyB.

Application has been made today for the admission of 5,250,000 shares in Voyager IT.com to trade on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) of the London Stock Exchange. The shares have been placed for cash at 12.5p per share to raise additional funds to help it acquire small companies in the IT and Internet sectors.

On-line PLC is to launch a fully automated advertising network, the company said today. AdvertWizard.com will offer 100 per cent banner exchange or 50 per cent revenue split, via a fully automated system with real-time, Web based progress reports.

The eVestment Company Plc said today it is proposing to raise up to £9.8 million (net of expenses) by means of a firm placing of up to 100,000,000 new ordinary shares.

e-capital has invested £225,000 in Video Networks Ltd in exchange for 15,000 ordinary shares, it was revealed today. VNL is a Video-on-Demand service provider operating over ADSL or any other broadband network.

10 Group plc -- the AIM listed multimedia company -- has acquired the goodwill, business and assets of Scintilla, a Birmingham-based e-business solutions provider, for a consideration of £60,000, consisting of £45,000 in cash and £15,000 in shares.

Search engineer, Inktomi Corp, has approved a two-for-one split of its common stock, its board announced today. Shareholders will receive one additional share for every share held on December 14, 1999. The new shares are expected to be mailed from the company's transfer agent on or around December 30, 1999.

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) has named Bracknell-based Web consultancy, Nvision, the "most promising young company" in its inaugural Growing Business Awards.

Shares in QXL.com jumped 40 per cent after the online auction house reported a deal with Excite, the

reported.

Sports Internet has applied for a further 266,327 new Sports Internet shares to be admitted to AIM, it announced today. The shares are being issued to those "dissentient Surrey shareholders" who have not accepted the share offer and whose Surrey Shares have been compulsorily acquired under the Companies Act 1985 procedure.

Insurer, Direct Line, is investing an initial £2 million for the first three months of 2000 to market its Web site, directline.com, and launch new products on-line. The investment will involve a mainstream consumer campaign focusing on how it claims it takes just two minutes to get a quote on-line. Oliver Prill has been appointed Direct Line's new MD of e-commerce.

AltaVista could be planning to IPO with a value of $5 billion (£3.1 billion) in March, according to the

. There is also speculation that AltaVista could snuggle up close to portal Lycos.

Greatdomains.com is looking to sell the URL worldbanking com…for $4 million.

The price for shares in 365 Corporation plc has been set at 160p -- a figure at the upper end of the predicted price range. According to 365 the offer has been oversubscribed. Share dealing will start on the London Stock Exchange tomorrow.