posted on January 21, 2001 10:40:18 PM
January 22, 2001
EBay Greatly Expands Live Online Auction Bidding
By JOHN SCHWARTZ
New York Times
EBay the largest online auction company, will announce an agreement today that allows users to participate in live bidding at 300 auction houses worldwide.
The company announced a limited live auction service last year through its eBay Premier site. That service was for buying works of fine art, wine and other luxury goods through a small number of auction houses, like eBay-owned Butterfields. Today's agreement, with the London-based company icollector, founded in 1994, will greatly expand the available live auctions and will expose eBay's 22.5 million registered users to those sites.
Calling the agreement between the two companies a "winning combination," James Corsellis, deputy chairman of icollector, said, "It's a marriage that never would have happened six or nine months ago."
Geoff Iddison, general manager of eBay Premier, said that the new agreement with icollector would change the face of live auctions worldwide by making an online audience an essential element.
"Auction houses will not be able to do without something like this," he said. Mr. Iddison noted that the deal would extend eBay's growing business in Europe, where many of icollector's auction houses are located. "They seemed the ideal partner to bring those auction houses on to eBay," he added.
The live auction system can be tapped into by any eBay registered member, using his or her computer and modem to review an online catalog and to register to take part in an auction. The member can then place absentee bids on items before the auction begins or enter live bids during the auction. A picture of the item appears on the screen, along with the current high bid and the "ask price" — the amount the auctioneer is pushing for the next increment of bidding.
In most auctions now, participants enter their bids over several days until the auction closes. During that time, they receive e-mails alerting them when they are outbid.
EBay has been embarrassed in recent months by a scheme in which sellers on its regular service inflated the prices of their own goods by placing bids under other screen names.
Mr. Corsellis said that the new auctions' affiliation with respected auction houses could give bidders a better sense of security when they try to buy expensive goods. "There are few people who would advise you to spend $10,000 with an individual," he said.
The deal between the two companies "is almost an ideal marriage of the traditional auction world with the reach of the Internet," said Derek Brown, an analyst with W. R. Hambrecht. Because many auction houses have long allowed telephone bidding, he said, "It almost seems like a natural extension of the traditional way of doing business."
