Excite@Home Goes To Work.com

Media/portal company Excite@Home (Nasdaq: ATHM) announced today that it has launched Work.com, a service for business professionals and their companies. Excite@Home says the new site is the first part of a major initiative to develop a business portal that features vertical industry content, communities, business applications and services that can be customized to business user’s needs.

“The business-to-business marketplace is exploding, and business professionals and companies have unique needs that are unmet by existing portals,” said Don Hutchison, senior vice president and general manager for Excite@Home’s @Work division.

@Work is the business-to-business division of Excite@Home. It provides e-business bandwidth, information and Web services, such as high-speed networking access, personalized business content and outsourced Web infrastructure.

“Work.com will leverage the distribution and programming expertise of Excite with the commercial access and application hosting experience of @Work to take advantage of this opportunity,” Hutchinson said. “The addition of Work.com to @Work Internet access and hosting solutions creates a complete set of tools that we can offer to businesspeople to better manage and grow their businesses.”

Partners Include E-Stamp & OfficeMax

The new Work.com service is also available via the new Business Channel on Excite.com. Channel content includes company and product information across 36 industries. The service also features business applications such as business e-mail, voice mail, online calendars, and Web site and storefront creation/hosting. Work.com’s applications and e-commerce partners include E-Stamp, OfficeMax, First Data Corp., iMall and Northpoint Communications.

Also available on Work.com is a directory of business resources on topics including e-commerce, finance, marketing, sales, law and human resources. Each resource area features content, applications and services. Work.com also provides links to other business-related areas on Excite, such as the Excite Careers channel and Excite Auctions.

AOL/AT&T Rumor Surrounds Excite@Home

Shares of Excite@Home climbed 13 percent on Wednesday, gaining 5-1/16 to 43-7/16 as rumors circulated that AT&T would sell its equity stake in the company to America Online. Such a deal could result in Excite@Home being split into two companies just four months after Excite and @Home merged. One scenario being floated is that AT&T would keep its stake in the @Home part of the business, while AOL would end up controlling Excite. AT&T has denied the rumors.

Excite@Home stock is giving back some of its gains in early trading today, falling 1-3/16 to 42-1/4.