Barclays B2B site launches

Barclays Bank will pilot the first of its business-to-business internet services next month in partnership with Oracle and the management consultancy arm of Arthur Andersen.

Barclays B2B.com is aimed at medium-sized UK firms. It has been designed as a multi-use business portal, offering customers access to a broad range of services. The first service will be secure purchasing for companies with sales of between £5m and £250m.

A restricted pilot will go live next month. It will have 15 corporate users, including two NHS trusts - Reading and Peterborough - which have been running early components of the system for the last five months. The system will become generally available this summer.

International web-based marketspaces and online supply chain services already exist in key business sectors such as car manufacturing, retail, chemicals and telecoms. Barclays says it is the first bank to move into this sector, offering a full procurement-to-payment service chain.

Although Barclays is beginning with eprocurement, it will soon be offering numerous other business services online, "from the purchase of stationery and raw materials through to the administration of human resources", said Chris Lendrum, chief executive for Barclays Corporate Banking. Travel management and recruitment services are also planned.

Barclays is determined to win a significant slice of the rapidly expanding European ecommerce market, which analyst Gartner predicts will be worth as much as $4tn (£2.5tn) by 2004.

Barclays' plans have not impressed its competitors. NatWest Bank claims that the new system is far from revolutionary.

"We have been running a business-to-business site for our business customers on an extranet since August last year," said Kevin Jennings, managing director of NatWest's Payment and Trade Services Products Group. "The Barclays announcement feels about 18 months behind."

See also:

Ecommerce: the online banking revolution

The internet is bringing about the second revolution in the banking sector in two decades. Julian Patterson looks at who the winners and losers are likely to be.  26 Jul 2000

Quick fix unveiled for corporate net banking

Irish company PKSOrygen has announced a corporate internet banking solution which it said will dramatically cut down the time it takes banks to launch internet based services.  10 May 2000

Oracle shapes up for ebusiness

The database giant has stopped selling software licences and is crossing the online pain barrier. We talk to Mark Jarvis, the company's vice president of global marketing.  10 Apr 2000

Barclays moves online with BT

Barclays Bank has recruited BT to build an internet-based network that will enable it put more of its services online.  30 Mar 2000

Banking mergers slash IT spending

Consolidation in the European banking sector will reduce IT spending in the region by $12.6bn over the next five years, according to a report by analyst Datamonitor.  27 Mar 2000

IBM to support B2B trading portals

IBM and outsourcing supplier CommerceQuest have promised to provide connectivity and integration services to 65 business-to-business (B2B) trading communities by the end of the year.  24 Mar 2000

Yahoo and AOL to set up B2B portals

Consumer portals Yahoo and America Online (AOL) have both announced plans to create online business-to-business (B2B) markets.  21 Mar 2000

eBay launches B2B website in the US

eBay has added a business-to-business (B2B) trading facility for smaller companies on its US-based online auction site.  17 Mar 2000

IBM, i2 and Ariba to offer B2B services

IBM, Ariba and i2 Technologies have teamed up in an attempt to provide integrated end to end services for business to business (B2B) ecommerce customers.  09 Mar 2000

Like this story? Spread the news by clicking below:

 del.icio.us     Digg this     reddit!