Net Profit: How to Invest and Compete in the Wild World of Internet Business (Jossey-Bass Business and Management Reader Series) - Softcover

Cohan, Peter S.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0787956872 ISBN 13: 9780787956875

Publisher: Jossey Bass, 2001

Synopsis

This title offers key guidelines to help determine which publicly traded Internet companies are most likely to succeed or fail. Which Internet companies will still be around tomorrow? "Net Profit" offers a way to cut through the hype and market overvaluation that often surrounds the Internet so that investors can make decisions that create good investment returns.

About this title

Review:

With all the uncertainty and hoopla around the Internet, how can investors and business managers hit the right financial buttons? In Net Profit, Peter S. Cohan, a premier Internet consultant and stock picker, analyses the trade's top companies--including Yahoo!, Amazon.com, America Online and Cisco Systems--and offers some compelling insights for investors and for businesses on the Web or those considering it. "This book is about the companies that are working to make economic sense of the Web," Cohan writes. "And it is about a search for the business strategies that distinguish the market leaders from their peers."

Cohan identifies nine segments of the industry -- infrastructure, consulting, venture capital, security, portals, e-commerce, Web content, Internet service providers and commerce tools. He judges the leading companies in the nine fields on their management, their breadth of customer service and, most critical, their ability to deliver a product that is so scarce and important that it carries a high price. Most Internet companies fail to meet all of Cohan's strict standards. Portal leader Yahoo!, for example, lacks economic clout over advertisers because of tough rivals in the traditional media. Cohan gives high grades to technology consultants like Gartner Group, venture capital firms and network builder Cisco. He loves Cisco because it controls 80 percent of the router market, keeps customers by providing other network components and shows a knack for acquiring smaller companies. Easy to understand, Net Profit features some key strategies for competing on the Internet. Cohan also helps companies evaluate whether it makes sense to even offer services on the Web. --Dan Ring, Amazon.com

Review:

"Net Profit clearly shows how to distinguish companies with successful Internet strategies from those that will be left behind in cyberspace. It is must reading for investors, executives, and anyone who wants to understand how to analyze or develop an Internet business model." (Fred M. Gerson, former vice president and CFO, Marimba, Inc.) "Why are portal companies, with only hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue, valued at tens of billions of dollars? And is this valuation justified and sustainable? In Net Profit, Peter Cohan explains why those who use the Internet to communicate with their customers will flourish, and those who do not will perish." (Roger Sippl, general partner, Sippl Macdonald Ventures)

About this edition

• Publisher: Jossey Bass
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0787956872
• ISBN 13: 9780787956875
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 352