EBay forms alliance with Sotheby's

Andrea Orr

PALO ALTO: The online auction site eBay Inc and Sotheby's Holdings Inc, the

world's oldest fine arts auctioneer, Thursday will announce they are teaming up

to bring more expensive art to eBay and more people to Sotheby's.

Under the deal, the two companies will unveil a new Sothebys.com site within

eBay this summer, featuring the same high-end art, antiques, jewelry and rare

books that Sotheby's now sells in auction houses around the world.

Sotheby's has operated its own online auction site at Sothebys.com for two

years, but said the new alliance with eBay will connect it with a much larger

audience through eBay's 42 million registered users around the world.

The new Sothebys.com Web site will also incorporate eBay's Live Auctions

technology to enable real-time online bidding for many of its offline auctions

in New York and London. The change will mean that anyone, anywhere in the world,

could conceivably participate in the Sotheby's auctions, as long as they have an

Internet connection.

Sothebys.com chairman David Redden said eBay's technology should also help

more art dealers post items on its Web site. "Sothebys.com is essentially a

network of expert dealers around the world who post property on the site,"

he said. "EBay's process for uploading information from sellers is

extremely important."

For eBay, which offers everything from clothing to cars to used computer

equipment on its site, the alliance will give it an opportunity to expand its

offerings of high-end art. The company made a big push into this area in 1999

when it acquired Butterfield & Butterfield, another big offline auction

house and a competitor of Sotheby's.

While that purchase helped eBay move into the premiere art arena, it did not

bring it dominance over Sothebys.com, which over the past two years has sold

about $100 million of merchandise, including a first printing of the US

Declaration of Independence, which was sold last year for $8.1 million.

Sotheby's stressed, however, that the deal did not signal a move away from

its traditional way of selling in show rooms with auction blocks and gavels,

which is still far and away its main business.

"We are absolutely and totally committed to our live auction

business," said Redden. "We have sales rooms around the world filled

with auctioneers and auctions. The Internet is a way for people to access

information about the live auctions. It's like the telephone. You can only go so

long without using it."

(C) Reuters Limited.