Business.com Secures New Round of Financing; Growth Potential of Business Search Drives $10 Million Investment from Benchmark Capital

Business Wire, Nov 8, 2004

SANTA MONICA, Calif. -- Business.com (www.business.com), the search engine designed and organized exclusively for business, today announced the closure of a new round of financing. Benchmark Capital, a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm, has invested $10 million in Business.com.

This new round of funding will enable Business.com to invest in technology infrastructure, product development, and sales and marketing to meet the growing market demand for its vertical business search capabilities. Business.com joins the impressive list of Benchmark Capital investments that includes eBay, Red Hat Software, Handspring and Juniper Networks. The Venture firm has more than $2 billion in committed capital.

Business.com was built from the ground up with an exclusive focus on fulfilling the search needs of business professionals. Through its proprietary taxonomy, business interpretation of search terms, and comprehensive directory structure, it has been able to deliver a markedly different search experience for business professionals than general search engines do.

"Business.com was founded in 1999 on the concept that the information needs of business professionals are different from those of consumers," said Jake Winebaum, CEO and founder of Business.com. "We've focused solely on this large and valuable market segment for the last five years, fine-tuning our service and laying the foundation for what's become a strong, profitable, and fast-growing business. Benchmark's investment now allows us to accelerate our product development and expand our sales and marketing efforts."

Business.com has not just survived in a sector where many of its earlier competitors have perished, but has continued to grow steadily and profitably. This growth is evident in the compounded annual revenue growth rate of over 150% over the past 4 years coupled with profitability and positive cash flow for the past 18 months.

"Having surveyed the business search space, we recognized Business.com as the established leader. Its vast distribution network and consistently positive feedback from advertisers is a testament to its ability to deliver high quality leads," said William Gurley, partner, Benchmark Capital. "With its exclusive focus on business search and directory, Business.com has built a self-sustaining and profitable business in a market that we believe is currently underserved. We see this investment as an opportunity to further leverage the company's technology, early leadership position and solid management team to fully realize its market potential."

About Business.com

Business.com is the search engine designed and organized strictly for business. It provides professionals easy access to business products, services, companies, news and other business information to help them get their jobs done more efficiently.

Founded in 1999 by eCompanies, Business.com was originally funded by major strategic investors including Pearson, Reed Business Information, and McGraw Hill. Still privately-held, Business.com added Benchmark Capital as a preferred stockholder in 2004.

Today, Business.com serves the needs of more than three million business searchers each month across a wide array of industries and job functions. Business.com reaches another 32 million through its distribution network which includes partners such as Forbes.com, Inc.com, FastCompany, and Internet.com.

With a proprietary taxonomy and classification system consisting of over 65,000 business categories, the company is a leader in the next generation of search. By categorizing business results in an intuitive order and filtering out unrelated consumer content, Business.com is able to anticipate the needs of professionals and allows them to easily locate relevant business information. For more information, please visit www.business.com.

About Benchmark

Founded in 1995, Benchmark Capital is a venture firm that's based on the principles of teamwork and an intense dedication to building technology companies of lasting value. We focus on providing superior service to entrepreneurs through a unique, team-oriented partnership in which every partner is equal in terms of both contribution and compensation.