ISP BlueCarrots has scrapped the launch of its community sites
after its backer, business incubator Cube 8, would not commit to further
funding.
According to Cube 8, BlueCarrots was proving unprofitable, and had
failed to meet spending targets. It decided to cut funding and scrap the
planned site launches when BlueCarrots failed to break even this
month.
Steve Masters, Cube 8's director of marketing and communications, said
that due to cost-cutting initiatives, proposed community sites such as
PinkCarrots for the gay community and BabyCarrots for parents would be
scrapped for good.
In a bid to curb costs and boost revenue, Cube 8 recently made three of
the senior management team at BlueCarrots redundant, including chief
executive Alan Smith.
Recently, Cube 8 pulled the plug on a contract with TEAMtalk.com, which
would have seen BlueCarrots paying the sports site for content. A
similar deal with ScreamingMedia was ended last month.
According to Masters, BlueCarrots will now focus on boosting revenues by
partnering with retail sites, and enabling retail merchants to access
its database of users through co-promotional activity.
"We have a loyal audience that is perfect for other shops and companies.
Pay users will gain access to this audience," he explained.
"BlueCarrots was not meeting its sales targets and was overstitching its
costs targets. Launching new sites would be the last thing we'd do when
we're trying to cut costs."
Masters admitted that Smith was brought into BlueCarrots last year with
a view to boosting revenues and pushing the firm to break even. He
conceded that sales targets for the ISP had been very high.
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