August 4, 1999

Xoom Acquires LiquidMarket

By BLOOMBERG NEWS

an Francisco -- Xoom.com Inc., an online direct-marketing company, said it acquired closely held LiquidMarket Inc. for about $45.8 million in stock to add comparison-shopping technology to its Web site.

Xoom.com will issue 1.06 million shares to LiquidMarket shareholders. Los Angeles-based LiquidMarket's software is designed to search for the best prices for products being sold by major Internet retailers. It will also let Xoom.com collect information about the buying patterns of its online customers.

Xoom.com, which has more than 9.2 million members, offers free Web pages and e-mail to users who agree to receive advertising for products like computer equipment. The San Francisco company is planning to combine with some Internet holdings of General Electric Co.'s NBC and Cnet Inc.'s Snap.com to create a new public company. The new company, to be called NBC Internet, will use Snap.com as its umbrella consumer brand.

The LiquidMarket service will be available to Xoom.com and Snap.com users in the next few months, covering office supplies, consumer electronics and computers. Additional product categories, such as books, videos and music, will be added soon after, Xoom.com said. Eventually, consumers will also be able to purchase goods found by LiquidMarket directly through the service.

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