As part of a bid to expand its female audience both online and on TV, NBC has agreed to exchange network promotion time for a minority stake in iVillage, a women's community Web site.
For an undisclosed number of iVillage shares, NBC will promote iVillage on both television and its NBC.com Web site. As part of the agreement, Snap.com, a portal jointly owned by NBC and CNET (CNWK), will work with iVillage to launch three sites covering parenting, family, and health issues. NBC will acquire a seat on the iVillage board of directors.
It's a good deal for iVillage, said NBC, especially as the company squares off against Oxygen Media, another women-centric Web network. "Promotional opportunity on a network is a much rarer commodity than cash," said Tom Rogers, president of NBC cable and business development.
IVillage is a network of 12 women-oriented sites, including Better Health, Fitness & Beauty, Food, Parent Soup, Relationships, and an interactive pregnancy calendar it calls "Womb with a View." Together, the sites get about 77 million page views per month. Those numbers made iVillage irresistible to NBC, which is trying to bolster its reach among women. Among the networks, NBC already has the largest audience of women between the ages of 25 and 49.
"Women are to NBC what kids are to Disney," said Rogers.
NBC wants to increase its reach among women because recent studies show that women make about 70 percent of consumer purchasing decisions in the average household. Advertisers are eager to target their spots to sites with a predominantly female audience.
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Infoseek renegotiates Netscape deal: Internet directory Infoseek said on Friday it has renegotiated a deal with Netscape Communications, reducing the portion of visitors to Netscape's NetCenter directory site that are steered to Infoseek's Internet search engine.
Under the former agreement, Infoseek (SEEK), based in Sunnyvale, California, automatically received 15 percent of Netcenter visitors who did not specify a search engine provider. Under the new agreement, Infoseek will receive 5 percent.
In addition, Infoseek will pay an average of 20 percent more for the Netscape traffic it receives.
Infoseek said it will continue as a premier search provider on Netscape's Netcenter and will still provide search service for those users who have selected Infoseek as the Preferred Search Provider on Netcenter.
The move comes as Infoseek tries to reduce its dependence on third-party traffic. In the first quarter of 1997, Netscape accounted for 44 percent of overall Infoseek traffic. Following a recent deal with Walt Disney (DIS) and Starwave, traffic is projected to fall to 4 percent in January.
The deal also comes on the heels of America Online's (AOL) agreement last week to buy Netscape for US$4.2 billion worth of stock.
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New Net IPO in the works: Modem Media.Poppe Tyson, a marketing firm that develops online ad campaigns for Fortune 500 companies, filed Monday to sell shares worth up to $45 million in an initial public offering.
The Westport, Connecticut, company boasts some of the Net's biggest advertisers as clients, including AT&T, IBM, and Intel. In addition to crafting ad banners and ad placement strategies, the company designs corporate Web sites and helps companies implement e-commerce plans. It plans to use the proceeds of the initial offering to pay off debt and expand its operations. BancBoston Robertson Stephens will underwrite the offering.
Like most Net companies seeking succor from Wall Street, Modem Media.Poppe Tyson has robust revenue growth but no profits. During the nine months ended 30 September, the company's revenue jumped nearly 70 percent to $30.4 million, yet it lost about $2 million. It foresees losses through 1999 at the very least, according to the prospectus filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
It will face stiff competition as it scrabbles for a bigger piece of the burgeoning online advertising market, expected to top $5 billion by 2000. Among the most formidable foes: Reinvent Communications, the product of a pending merger between USWeb (USWB) and CKS Group (CKSG).
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Cisco's Selsius deal done: Cisco Systems said Monday it completed its $145 million purchase of Selsius Systems from Intecom, a subsidiary of the French corporation Lagardere SCA. Selsius makes PBX phone equipment that use IP connections to send phone calls. The purchase will help Cisco develop a new generation of office devices that combines voice and data over the same network.
Cisco (CSCO) plans to expand Selsius' products. Selsius' PBX system works like a traditional business phone system, including common features like multiple lines, hold and call transfer. Calls are compressed to use less bandwidth and sent over a local area network -- eliminating the need for a separate network of telephone wire and switching devices.
As part of the acquisition, Cisco plans to demonstrate Selsius' equipment on its own corporate infrastructure. The traditional PBX system in the company's 40-building San Jose, California, campus will be replaced with the new subsidiary's products.
Reuters contributed to this report.
