Mar 17, 2015

Excite to Acquire Netbot for $35 Million Published: October 18, 1997 REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Oct. 17— Excite Inc. has agreed to buy Netbot Inc., which makes software for finding and buying products on the Internet, for $35 million in stock, to attract more shoppers to the directory's site. Excite plans later this year to add Netbot's Jango software to its Internet search service to make it easier for consumers to shop on line. The closely held Netbot, based in Seattle, was founded last year by two University of Washington professors. Excite, which is based in Redwood City and is the No. 2 Internet directory behind Yahoo Inc., last month revamped the shopping area on its site and has signed agreements with on-line merchants including Amazon.com Inc. in an effort to increase revenue by promoting merchants and taking a cut of their sales. Consumers use Netbot's software to search merchant Web sites and data bases to get product information, comparative reviews and prices. The software is designed to make it easier and faster to find products on the Web.