PhilWeb gets more partners

Internet stock PhilWeb.Com has entered into a private placement deal with Startech Holdings Ltd., a British Virgin Islands-based firm, and a marketing deal with the Nasdaq-listed ITXC Corp. in its continued bid to become the dominant cyberspace network provider in the country.

PhilWeb corporate information officer Roberto San Jose told the Philippine Stock Exchange that a private placement of one billion shares, representing about 1.2 percent of the company's expanded capital, was made to Startech for P200 million ($5 million). Startech is an investment company which specializes in technology companies.

Under the terms, Startech has agreed to a lock-up period of at least one year. The placement will be priced at 20 centavos per share, which is approximately a 15 percent premium over the stock's average closing price in the last 30 days.

San Jose said PhilWeb intends to use the proceeds of the private placement to accelerate the rollout of its cybercafe network. The company plans to put in place 1,000 cybercafe, to be branded Cyberworld, nationwide over the next two years.

At the same time, San Jose said PhilWeb has entered into an agreement with ITXC Corp., the world's leading provider of Internet-based value-added services, for a strategic partnership which will market and provide ITXC's products and services in the Philippines.

PhilWeb president Alex Villamar noted that with this partnership, "we believe that leading Internet businesses around the world will now begin to look at PhilWeb as their partner of choice in the Philippines."

New Jersey-based ITXC provides phone-to-phone wholesale calls via the Internet and has been chosen by nine of the top 12 US and European carriers to complete their customers' calls.

ITXC also offers web-based PC-to-PC and PC-to-phone calling to their customers.

Villamar said that PhilWeb will bundle ITXC's services with other of the company's Internet-based products to offer its clients a suite of value added solutions.

PhilWeb, which is majority owned by the group of former Trade Minister Roberto Ongpin, is bent on launching a full chain of revenue-generating projects to harness the vast business potentials of the Internet.