Buy.com
 |
|
| Subsidiary | |
| Industry | Internet |
| Founded | September 12, 1997 |
| Founder | Scott Blum |
| Headquarters | Aliso Viejo, California, U.S. |
|
Area served
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Worldwide |
|
Key people
|
Hiroshi Mikitani, CEO Fumio Kobayashi, president |
| Products | Retail |
| Services | Online shopping |
| Parent | Rakuten, Inc. |
| Website | rakuten |
Rakuten.com is an e-commerce marketplace based in Aliso Viejo, California. Previously known as Buy.com, it was founded in 1997 by Scott Blum. In 2010, it was purchased by Japanese company Rakuten, and rebranded as Rakuten.com.
Buy.com originally sold only computers, at below cost, intending to bring in revenue through advertising and ancillary services such as sales of warranties and equipment leases, before expanding into numerous other categories, including software, books, videos and games. The company sold $125 million worth of goods and services in 1998, its first full year, beating Compaq's 1984 record for most first-year sales.
After raising $120 million from Japanese tech company SoftBank in 1998 and 1999, founder Scott Blum sold the remainder of his stake to SoftBank in 1999 shortly before Buy.com's $195 million initial public offering in early 2000. On February 8, 2000, Buy.com went public at $13 per share and rose to $37.50 per share that day, its peak price. Stock values dropped in the year following Buy.com's initial public offering, and it was delisted from the for failing to maintain a stock price above $1 per share. In February 2001, the UK arm of buy.com was sold to John Lewis (UK department store), and the technology was repurposed to create a new transactional website for the John Lewis chain. In November 2001, Blum reacquired Buy.com for $23.6 million (about 17 cents per share), and took the company private.
In 2002, Buy.com went beyond selling solely electronics, movies and music, adding more soft goods to their catalog, such as sports equipment, apparel, shoes, health and beauty products. It was at this time that Blum placed a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal promising Amazon.com customers that Buy.com would prove to be the better buying option. This statement came shortly after Buy.com announced a 10% below Amazon.com cost on all books sold on the site and free shipping site-wide, with no minimum purchase required. At the time, Amazon had 25 million customers, approximately five times as many as Buy.com.
In March 2002, Buy.com announced its first issue of Buy.com Magazine, providing information about the latest electronic devices and computers, with four issues per year and a circulation of five million. The magazine was later converted into an all-digital publication.
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Wikipedia