Short overview on the 4 Internet big-players. Impressive…..

Amazon

– founder: Jeff Bezos
– created in: 1994
– presented in 7 countries
– number of employees: 9’000
– profitable since: 2003
– IPO: spring 1997
– revenues 2004: $5 billion, net income: $430 million
– market capitalization (March 2005): $12.6 billion
– available cash: $1.15 billion
– some record figures: during last Chritsmas, in one day ==> 2.8 million orders, i.e. 32 orders per second!

Yahoo!

– founders: Jerry Yang, David Filo
– created in: 1994
– number of full-time employees: 7’600
– profitable since: 2002
– IPO: April 1996
– revenues 2004: $3.5 billion, net income: $839 million
– market capitalization (March 2005): $49 billion
– available cash: $3.8 billion
– some record figures: 165 million users

eBay

– founder: Pierre Omidyar
– created in: 1995
– presented in 33 countries
– number of employees: 5’700
– profitable since: 1996
– IPO: September 1998
– revenues 2004: $3.3 billion, net income: $778 million
– market capitalization (March 2005): $42.2 billion
– available cash: $1.2 billion
– some record figures: 430 million products available on eBay, 147 million users

Google

– founders: Larry Page, Sergey Brin
– created in: 1998
– number of employees: 3’000
– profitable since: 2001
– IPO: September August 2004
– revenues 2004: $3.2 billion, net income: $400 million
– market capitalization (March 2005): $61 billion
– available cash: $2.5 billion
– some record figures: 200 million search requests per day