PurchasePro Soars on AOL Ad Deal

PurchasePro, Inc. (Nasdaq: PPRO) rose US$1.73 to $29.19 early Wednesday after the company announced an expanded alliance with AOL Time Warner (NYSE: AOL) that includes a print and television advertising campaign.

PurchasePro, which makes business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce software, said it will promote its products “across a broad array of AOL Time Warner television and print brands.”

PurchasePro said that the agreement gives the company its first “multi-million dollar offline advertising campaign.” The company’s ads will appear in such AOL Time Warner publications as Fortune, as well as on TV stations including CNN.

“Our strategic relationship with AOL Time Warner provides a marketing reach that is unduplicated, and provides us with a valued partner to help drive our growth,” said PurchasePro chief operating officer Shawn McGhee.

PurchasePro and AOL formed an e-commerce alliance last year, creating the Netbusiness marketplace for companies to buy and sell products and services over the AOL, Netscape and Compuserve properties.

AOL Time Warner co-chief operating officer Bob Pittman said his company will use its “promotional power to provide new business opportunities for PurchasePro.” AOL Time Warner has media interests in movies, magazines, television, books and music, as well as the Internet.

PurchasePro, headquartered in Las Vegas, Nevada, operates an online marketplace that serves more than 30,000 businesses. The company’s software also powers some 240 private marketplaces. Earlier this month, the company said it would develop two online marketplaces for Honeywell, Inc.

McGhee joined the company in November after serving as president of Office Depot, Inc. (NYSE: ODP), where he led the office supply company’s e-commerce initiative and managed its $4 billion supply chain.

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