06-23-2007, 10:48 AM
Quote:Entrepreneurs Jake Winebaum and Sky Dayton were widely mocked for lavishing $7.5 million on a single Internet domain name -- business.com -- back in 1999. It was the single highest price paid for a domain name at the time.
Now look who is having the last laugh.
The company that grew out of business.com -- a search engine used by businesses to find products and services -- is now on the auction block, and could fetch anywhere between $300 million and $400 million, according to people familiar with the matter...
full article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118248076104444461.html
commentary:
Quote: Theres no way its worth it:
* Sex.com reportedly sold for $14 million. If sex is arguably the Internets biggest industry its impossible to argue Business.com is worth $400 million. Beer.com went for $7 million. Do you want sex and beer or business? Its a no brainer folks.
* Theres no there there. Business.com was one of the vertical search engines I had on my Life without Google lists. The problem: Its all sponsored and featured links. Its more yellow pages than a real search.
* Business.coms goal, which is to drive readers to merchants for a bounty, doesnt sync with the reported buyers models. If youre Dow Jones are you really going to waste a URL like business.com just to shuffle readers to merchants? No. Content is going to get involved and arguably screw up the current model.
full article: http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=5475