FRAMINGHAM (03/31/2000) - QAD Inc. in Carpinteria, California, this week plans to release the first pieces of a promised new line of business-to-business order-management applications for manufacturers. The first version of the Java-based eQ software was designed to manage Internet sales and inventory replenishment. Modules for online procurement and other tasks will be added later this year. The applications will work with multiple enterprise resource planning systems, not just QAD's own back-office software. Pricing starts at $185,000.
Ockham Technologies Inc., a startup that makes sales management software, this week plans to launch a Web site that sales executives can use to get information on management techniques and to benchmark their company's performance against industry averages. The site (salesmanagement.com) is free to registered users, but Atlanta-based Ockham plans to add fee-based services such as recruiting help and computer-based training courses this summer.
PeopleSoft Inc. in Pleasanton, California, last week said it plans to use Walnut Creek, California-based Commerce One Inc.'s MarketSite trading exchange software in a new service offering - designing and building online marketplaces by contract. PeopleSoft also plans to launch its own exchange to sell products from online catalogs included in the Commerce One software.
BPA Systems Inc. in Austin, Texas, last week announced application server software that lets users download information stored in Oracle Corp. databases to cellular phones and other wireless devices via the Web. Pricing starts at $100 per end user plus a 20 percent annual maintenance fee.
A new study predicts that more advertising dollars will flow to the Internet than to television in the next five years. The Myers Group LLC, an Endicott, New York-based economic research firm that has been tracking media spending for 20 years, predicted last week that U.S. online advertising expenditures will increase from $4.32 billion this year to $32.5 billion in 2005. U.S. television ad money will increase from $16.8 billion to $19.2 billion over the same period, according to the Myers report.
A January report from Jupiter Communications Inc., a New York-based market research firm, also forecast significant Internet advertising growth. However, that report set the figure at a much smaller amount of $11.5 billion by 2003.
Going Mobile: There may be as many as 1 billion Internet access devices active in the U.S. by 2003. The number of U.S. mobile Internet service subscribers may also reach as many as 4 million by the end of this year.
Source: The Yankee Group, Boston
According to a survey of companies with at least $100 million in annual revenue, 77 percent viewed online marketing as their top e-commerce priority, while only 32 percent had invested in supplier management. Source: Meta Group Inc., Stamford, Connecticut.
About 85 percent of Internet users surveyed in a recent poll said privacy was their main concern regarding the Internet. Only 19 percent expressed any worries about Internet taxation. Source: Nua Ltd., DublinShoppers in California spent $5.9 billion at e-commerce sites last year, the most of any state. Texans were the next biggest online spenders, at $3.2 billion.
Source: International Data Group, Framingham, Massachusetts.