e-commerce

Amazon's earnings report for the first quarter of 2011 wasn't pretty, even considering that Wall Street was expecting tepid performance.

Analysts were expecting earnings of $0.61 per share--and Amazon posted $0.44. Net sales were up 38 percent year-over-year to $9.86 billion, but it's the earnings per share that really counts.

That's a sign that spending--for example, on projects like the Cloud Drive media storage service, its own Android app store, the cheaper ad-supported Kindle that was announced earlier this month, and the e-reader's new "library lending" feature--may have been higher … Read more

eBay, which has been on quite the mobile start-up acquisition spree of late, made it public today that it has acquired Where, a company that makes location-based mobile applications and operates a network of local ads and deals.

More specifically, Boston-based Where has been purchased by eBay's PayPal division, which plans to make the start-up a part of its suite of services for local businesses while keeping the Where consumer app intact.

"Local commerce companies like Where are blurring the lines between in-store and online shopping," noted a PayPal blog post by senior director of global communications … Read more

A group of security researchers say they have found ways to trick online cashier systems into ordering items for free or at a discount.

Researchers from Indiana University and Microsoft Research found security holes in a software development kit from payment hosting provider Amazon Payments, Rui Wang, a Ph.D. student at Indiana University, told CNET in a recent interview. Amazon fixed the problems after being notified by the researchers, and integration bugs found in merchant shopping-cart applications and implementations on several retail sites have also been fixed.

The software they examined contained "logic flaws that can be exploited … Read more

SAN FRANCISCO--There will be quite the land grab ahead as mobile trends continue to make their way into the e-commerce world. Or at least that's what it seems based on two short talks at this week's Web 2.0 Expo about the future of commerce, one yesterday afternoon from Google vice president of payments Osama Bedier, and one this morning from eBay vice president of global product management Dane Glasgow.

"Shoppers don't distinguish between online and mobile. They think of mobile as an extension of their everyday activities," Glasgow said. "Mobile's clearly having … Read more

eBay announced today it will acquire GSI Commerce, an e-commerce marketing services company, for $29.25 a share--which will likely come out to around $2.4 billion.

To put things into perspective, that's more than it paid for PayPal and only slightly less than it paid for Skype (which is has now sold off). The acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter.

"We intend to lead the next generation of commerce innovation. The acquisition of GSI, which offers the most comprehensive integrated suite of online commerce and interactive marketing services available, will significantly strengthen our ability … Read more

It was only a matter of time: American Express has taken a full-out dive into the crowded and ambiguous space full of companies both big and small that are trying to figure out the future of consumer payment transactions. The company today announced Serve, a set of applications designed to let users make payments more easily online or with mobile phones via special accounts funded by credit cards, debit cards, or bank accounts. With this product, the company "aims to expand into new segments of the market that do not rely on traditional charge and credit cards to manage … Read more

It turned down a $6 billion acquisition offer. It wants a $25 billion initial public offering. It more or less created a breed of advertising that now every company wants into. It's grown faster than just about any company, ever. But according to multiple signals across the Web, things may be afoul at Groupon.

The latest is a chart released by Yipit, a start-up that aggregates cities' daily-deal offerings--more than 400 sites' worth--into a customizable digest that highlights individual users' preferences. Yipit said in a blog post today that it found a 32 percent decline in Groupon revenue per … Read more

Tech hardware advice site and reviews aggregator Retrevo is opening its own online store. The company has struck deals with 10 online resellers that will fulfill orders for Retrevo, but buyers will conduct all their business on Retrevo.com itself. Retrevo is also taking on the support role for customers who need help with products they purchase on its store.

Retrevo's main function, to date, has been to provide tech buying advice to consumers. It aggregates reviews data from professional sites (like CNET) as well as consumer reviews (from sites like Amazon) and generates reviews scores and other analytics to help users make buying decisions. There's also a strong editorial hand at work at Retrevo to come up with the criteria that the site's algorithms use to rank products.

Retrevo has always linked out to online stores for people who want to purchase a product they read about. Today's new store function replaces the links to other stores with Retrevo's own "Add to Cart" button for select items.

The ethical wall There is a barrier at good reviews sites between opinion and commerce, for one big reason: If a site is recommending a product and then turns around and makes a direct profit from selling it, one could think the site's recommendations are tainted by potential profits. Retrevo CEO Vipin Jain says you can still produce a trustworthy editorial service even if you are helping readers close the loop in commerce.

… Read more

LONDON--A day might be coming when the power of Facebook means that major companies no longer bother with their own Web sites.

That was the startling if self-promotional possibility sketched out by Stephen Haines, commercial director of Facebook's U.K. operation, while speaking today at the Technology for Marketing and Advertising conference here. Essentially, Haines argued, companies' interactions with their customers could take place so often on Facebook that company Web sites would fall by the wayside.

To bolster his argument, Haines showed statistics comparing how many times Facebook users have clicked a company's "like" button … Read more