Online community theglobe.com Corp. Wednesday acquired Web hosting services leader WebJump.com for $12.5 million in stock.

The acquisition bolsters theglobe.com's (TGLO) business-to-business Web offerings and expands the company's ability to reach Web-savvy Internet users, extending the Network's audience by more than 48 percent.

Launched in October 1998 by parent company Infonent.com Inc., WebJump hosts more than 625,000 mostly business and professional sites and registers approximately 1,500 new sites each day.

WebJump pioneers services that revolutionize the value proposition of the free Web hosting space, including a sub-domain naming structure that allows WebJump customers to host their Web site off a simple "business card friendly" domain name as well as allowing users to host fully qualified domains on the free service. WebJump was also the first to offer 25 megabytes of disc space and provides 24/7 live customer support within a free hosting environment.

"Our network audience has doubled in size during the year through both acquisitions and organic growth of theglobe.com brand", said Todd Krizelman, co-chief executive officer, theglobe.com.

"The acquisition of WebJump further extends our network as we now offer premier business and professional free web hosting space on the Internet. This deal complements our existing strategy as we work towards integrating our group communication products, such as globeclubs, within the business community."

One of the world's largest independent community sites, the globe.com offers a network of e-mail clubs called globeclubs, as well as state-of-the-art Web site building tools.


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