Word: surplus
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...China. That didn't sit well with new Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who promptly canceled the order. The Army ended up paying China for 600,000 berets it won't be distributing to the troops. Luckily for burgeoning fashionistas, the extras will likely be sold in Army surplus stores...
With 30,000 suppliers still unsigned by VCE and with worldwide surplus-chip inventories estimated to be worth $30 billion, the company seems poised to take even greater advantage of the network effect. "The potential is huge," says John McCarthy, an e-business analyst for Forrester Research. Indeed, projections that the semiconductor business will shrink 17% this year seem to be a boon...
...firm raking in cash from the tech downturn is Overstock.com based in Salt Lake City, Utah. Overstock is the world's first purely e-tail site to break even, a feat achieved after burning through just $27 million in venture capital--pocket change in Silicon Valley. Overstock, which buys surplus tech products at liquidation prices and sells them to consumers at an average 60% off the retail price, is best known as a "vulture" site, raking over the bones of deceased dotcoms and snapping up $44 million of their equipment...
Patrick Byrne, the site's founder and CEO, says his next project is to do his version of VCE: resell surplus tech hardware not only to consumers but also to mom-and-pop retailers for around 40% off the wholesale price. By comparison, mega-stores like WalMart usually get at most a 10% discount from jobbers or liquidation agents. Couple that with Overstock's tiny minimum wholesale order--six units--and it appears that Byrne is trying to play Robin Hood to America's 130,000 small retailers. "These guys are getting put out of business by WalMart because they...
Like VCE, Byrne has found a niche, as manufacturers routinely overproduce by 5% to 10%, a figure that naturally rises during a downturn. Nearly all his surplus items are produced in such small numbers that neither chain stores like WalMart nor catalogs will touch them. The only place such dribs and drabs can go is online...