Net Dreams

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'I can't talk about it,' he says, which is by now a term of art, nondisclosure-agreement code for 'I'm in negotiations.' It's the hint I need; I crunch on recent news and put it together. First there was a buying spree for e-commerce software companies. Now there is a buying spree for the next piece of the portal puzzle, comparison-shopping engines, such as Ben Chiu's KillerApp. Amazon.com bought Junglee for a reported $180 million. Infoseek bought Quando for $17 million. Inktomi spent $90 million on C2B, which doesn't even have its beta ready. KillerApp is in their league, easily; Internet World magazine ranks it the most efficient Internet shopping site.

Ben is sanguine. Tactfully, he negotiates the words: 'It's a natural thing to be bought. It's not selling out, really. I've had this vision for a few years, and slowly the rest of the market has begun to value what I've done at the same level that I value it. When that happens, when you get offered what you know you're worth, then every entrepreneur knows it's the right time.'

Michael Zilly sends me e-mail : 'It seems prema-ture to write about my adventures in California, because nothing has come to fruition.' It is the first e-mail he has sent that is not signed 'Keep on rockin' in the free world.' He says he's thinking of taking a class to help him pass a COBOL certification exam, which will qualify him to be hired as a $35-an-hour 'implementation consultant' with one of the many Y2K-conversion firms.

He's down to his last month's rent.

Ben has stayed his course through a string of frustrating negotiations. His company has doubled in size to nine employees. He talks about how 'going public might still be the best option' and says, 'Look for me on NASDAQ in 18 months.'

His attorneys recommend that he get a personal financial adviser, and they refer him to the man who advises Yahoo!'s Jerry Yang and Netscape's co-founder Marc Andreessen. This guy is Ben's ticket to guanxi. The adviser introduces Ben to the mergers-and-acquisitions bankers at BT Alex. Brown, who are able to revive interest in his company when the stock market rebounds. I am privileged to the negotiations that follow, but under the condition that I not reveal the various parties until the outcome is final.

The negotiations feel as hectic as a sports-tournament ladder with home and away matches. Ben receives a soft offer from a television/Internet media company, which Alex. Brown parlays into a second soft offer from that company's even larger competitor. Alex. Brown then parlays this interest into informal negotiating sessions with three of the top ten Web portals, and Ben is flying off to Seattle and Boston. Within a month, Ben has five major companies poking him with a stick and has conducted a technical due-diligence session, while another spate of mergers takes the industry by storm, which continues to alter the playing field.

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