“PayPal's growth may surpass parent eBay - Washington Times” plus 4 more |
- PayPal's growth may surpass parent eBay - Washington Times
- Wells Fargo names new regional commercial banker - Biz Times
- Don’t count on a year-end bonus - Atlanta Journal Constitution
- Verizon Business Launches Enhanced IT Security Consulting - Converge Network Digest
- Small Business Administration OKs Indiana storm aid - WNDU
| PayPal's growth may surpass parent eBay - Washington Times Posted: 09 Nov 2009 10:18 AM PST SAN FRANCISCO | Most people know eBay Inc. for its online marketplace, where deals abound on everything from gadgets to antique furniture. But soon, eBay's biggest business will likely be PayPal, the online payment service that has been growing steadily even as the economy has stumbled. EBay has spent much of the past two years trying to improve its faltering marketplace business, hoping to increase buyers' trust and clean up the look of its Web site. In the meantime, PayPal has thrived as more consumers and merchants use it to send money online. Its growth is expected to continue in spite of competition from Amazon.com Inc. and Google Inc., which have services that online retailers sometimes offer alongside PayPal. PayPal bills itself as a shopper's online wallet. Users set up accounts and link them to bank accounts and credit cards, making it easy to transfer cash into the account. Then users can make payments through PayPal using either their cash balances or the underlying credit card. PayPal users can also send cash to someone based on as little information as an e-mail address or cell phone number. But, unlike what happens with a credit or debit card online, PayPal doesn't share your financial information with merchants. That brings peace of mind to people who might otherwise worry about shopping at a site they've never heard of. PayPal, which began in 1998 as a way for people to beam cash from one Palm Pilot to another, was bought by eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002 and has been a steady performer. The service charges fees for certain transactions, and in the most recent quarter it reported $688 million in revenue, a 15 percent jump from last year. As of the end of September, 78 million people had active PayPal accounts, up from 65 million a year ago. To try to maintain its advantage, this week PayPal opened its system to third-party developers, which will mean PayPal can be built into all sorts of applications. For instance, an iPhone app could let consumers order a pizza and pay for it with PayPal. PayPal has kept its big lead in online payments largely because people find it convenient and because it's hard to build a competing system. Shoppers and merchants both need to be using an online payment system for it to have any value. And every state and country has its own rules for e-commerce. PayPal has managed to navigate these waters — it accepts payment in 24 currencies — and analysts don't yet see Checkout by Amazon or Google Checkout as much of a threat. John Donahoe, eBay's CEO, has said he expects PayPal to surpass the marketplaces business in revenue simply because PayPal targets all of e-commerce while eBay is one of many online sales sites. "PayPal can go well beyond that in the next three to five years," he said in an interview last week. The company projects PayPal's revenue will be between $4 billion and $5 billion in 2011. EBay's forecast for the marketplaces business, which includes the main eBay.com Web site and other sites such as Shopping.com, calls for $5 billion to $7 billion in revenue that year. Mr. Donahoe also thinks PayPal can eventually make more money than the marketplaces business, even though PayPal's profit margins are lower. PayPal's opportunities figure to expand with its new move to open its platform to outside software developers. The process took two years, said PayPal's president, Scott Thompson, largely because of the need to deal with banking regulations while keeping up the company's fraud protections. But from here, the open platform should incur few costs for PayPal, Janney Montgomery Scott analyst Shawn Milne said. More than 1,000 entrepreneurs have been testing the system, known as PayPal X. Among them is Michael Ivey, the founder and CEO of Twitpay, a start-up that lets people send money over short-messaging site Twitter. When Twitpay started last year, it used Amazon's payments service to transfer funds. PayPal's huge user base clinched the decision to make the change, he said. Further growth — be it on cell phones or the Web — will have restrictions, though. While PayPal boasts that more 3 million online retailers accept it for transactions (not counting merchants on eBay who accept PayPal), many vendors offer it alongside services from Google, Amazon and others, to give shoppers as many choices as possible. As PayPal shows up on more Web sites, these rivals could, too. Because of PayPal's size, any hiccups can have big ramifications. In August, a series of breakdowns made the service unable to process any transactions worldwide for several hours. But Mr. Thompson is confident. He credits the fact that the service saves people time by making it easier to shop online. "The world needs what we do," he said. This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wells Fargo names new regional commercial banker - Biz Times Posted: 09 Nov 2009 10:18 AM PST Published November 9, 2009 - BizTimes Daily Wells Fargo & Company said today it has named Lisa Johnson as regional head for commercial banking in Illinois and southeastern Wisconsin. This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Don’t count on a year-end bonus - Atlanta Journal Constitution Posted: 10 Nov 2009 03:29 AM PST The Atlanta Journal-Constitution More small-business employees can expect no end-of-year bonuses or gifts for 2009. A recent survey of small business owners or managers showed fewer of them planning gifts or cash for their workers. "Business owners are still feeling pinched cash wise," said American Express business adviser Alice Bredin. AmEx's small business division conducted the survey. Last year, 44 percent of those surveyed said employees would get an end-of-year bonus. This year, only 31 percent did. Even fewer are planning raises: 16 percent, compared with 30 percent last year. Meanwhile, in 2008, 46 percent of owners or managers said employees would get holiday gifts. This year, it's 35 percent. The business owners or managers surveyed oversaw companies with fewer than 100 employees. According to the government's Small Business Administration, companies with under 500 workers employed about half of all private sector employees as of 2006. The survey also found that, of those still giving a present, 42 percent said they'll give fewer or cheaper gifts to customers and employees. The businesses are cutting back on employee compensation and presents before client gifts, Bredin said, because customer presents can be important marketing tools. "If there are no customers, there is no discussion about employees." In the survey, nearly half the companies surveyed planned to give presents to customers, about the same as last year. Those surveyed said they would spend $455, on average, on the holiday presents. In 2008, small business owners planned to spend $457 — and in fall 2007, it was an average of $1,483. In one bit of good news, the survey did show the number of workers who would be getting time off over the holidays remained the same as last year, at 47 percent. The random survey of 500 small business owners or managers was conducted over the phone from Oct. 6-14. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points. This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Verizon Business Launches Enhanced IT Security Consulting - Converge Network Digest Posted: 09 Nov 2009 10:21 PM PST
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Verizon Business Launches Enhanced IT Security Consulting
Verizon said its DDISC also helps organizations manage compliance with security standards and regulations such as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and Gramm Leach Bliley Act (GLBA).
Previously, Verizon Business had offered its security consulting services to businesses on a custom basis. To create DDISC, Verizon Business standardized and strengthened these services to ensure uniformity across its global security practice.
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| Small Business Administration OKs Indiana storm aid - WNDU Posted: 10 Nov 2009 03:36 AM PST The U.S. Small Business Administration has approved a disaster declaration for 11 southern Indiana counties hit by a wave of severe storms in August. The declaration covers Clark, Floyd, Jennings, Bartholomew, Decatur, Harrison, Jackson, Jefferson, Ripley, Scott and Washington counties. Qualified homeowners, renters, businesses and nonprofit groups in those counties can apply for low-interest loans to replace damaged or destroyed real estate, business assets and personal property. They can apply for loans ranging from $40,000 to $2 million. The federal aid announced Monday follows severe storms that dumped up to 10 inches of rain in some locations of southern and central Indiana between Aug. 4-9. This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Verizon Business launched a new Data Discovery, Identification and Security Classification (DDISC) service to help businesses address the heightened risk they face because they often do not know where all of their data resides.
The DDISC services -- which are immediately available in North America, Europe and the Asia-Pacific region -- discover, identify and classify data stored on a business' servers and extended network linking customers, partners and suppliers. As part of the services, expert Verizon business IT security consultants review the relevance and sensitivity of the data, and compare it with the enterprise customer's business goals. This information is then used to determine whether the company is handling and securing its data appropriately.
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