-Think New Ideas, New York, reported net income of $770,000 for the fourth quarter. Quarterly revenue grew to $14.7 million, a 183 percent increase over last year. The company also reported a 29 percent increase in revenue over the fiscal 1998 third quarter. Full-year revenues grew 145 percent to $42.6 million, from $17.4 million the prior year. Think’s clients include Pioneer, Gillette, Procter & Gamble, Oracle and Hewlett-Packard.
-Thinking Media and iDeutsch, both New York, last week launched a new banner campaign for Tanqueray featuring the Mr. Jenkins character in an interactive golf game. Users can drive and putt an olive into a martini glass in the ad, which is running on sites including Playboy, Bloomberg, Music Boulevard and Lycos. The sites also offer incentives for playing the game. A six-page spread featuring Mr. Jenkins will kick off in September.
-Concrete Media, New York, is working with NBC Online to provide content from its teen-focused portal, Bolt, to NBC’s Back-to-School Guide. The guide, at www.nbc.com, will be advertised during ER, Dateline and other NBC prime time programs. Concrete Media has also retained investment bank The Jordan, Edmiston Group to assist it in developing strategic relationships.
-IXL, Atlanta, appointed Scott Leslie president of its Memphis office and will expand the staff there to service the mid-South market. Leslie was formerly general sales manager at Memphis’ NBC affiliate, WMC-TV. iXL has also acquired 8-year-old full-service new media firm Image Communications. The company, based in Washington, D.C., will service clients in the mid-Atlantic region.
-Zapata Corp., Houston, last week announced its acquisition of New York-based game site publisher Attitude Network as it proceeds with its portal-building strategy. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Attitude Network is the publisher of six gamer sites including Happy Puppy and Games. They will be added to Zap.com, an aggregation of 31 special interest sites.
-Visa, San Francisco, and MasterCard, Purchase, N.Y., secured marketing alliances last week with online vendors N2K, New York, and Preview Travel, San Francisco, respectively. Visa becomes the preferred form of payment on N2K’s Music Boulevard Network while MasterCard becomes the exclusive payment system sponsor for Preview Travel and its business center section.
-Digital City, the local online guide that is majority-owned by Dulles, Va.-based America Online, has struck a two-year distribution deal with Netscape to become the exclusive local content provider for Netscape’s Netcenter. Terms of the deal were not released. The venture gives Digital City an injection of traffic derived entirely from the Web as it seeks to expand from its current 50-market network. Netscape, Mountain View, Calif., satisfies its need to bring local editorial content to its NetCenter portal.
-Online car-buying consultant Auto-By-Tel, Irvine, Calif., has changed its name to autobytel.com Inc. to more directly reflect its Web roots. The name change coincides with a site relaunch that features enhanced research tools and pricing details.
-ETrade is leveraging its existing relationship with Softbank Corp., in making deals with other online properties in which Softbank has investments. Last week, the Palo Alto, Calif.-based online brokerage struck marketing alliances with Yahoo and computer publishing giant Ziff-Davis. ETrade will become a sponsor of Yahoo Financial News and Insider Trading, two areas within the popular Yahoo Finance channel. The deal with ZD calls for ETrade to be designated the exclusive provider of investing tools on ZDNet, Ziff-Davis’ compilation of sites.
-Online gardening product retailer Garden Escape, Austin, Texas, today will launch The Garden Network, an advertising network for the home and garden category that brings together four gardening Web sites. Advertisers can buy ads on Garden.com, Virtual Garden, Dig the Net and Horticulture Magazine Online.
IQ News: Bits
