Behind the Headlines: Experts predict more boo.com failures to come

NEWS The demise of boo.com's is going to trigger a chain reaction among ailing dot-coms. That's according to this week's Behind the Headlines guests. Clive Longbottom, analyst at Strategy Partners, is expecting a domino effect. He said: "The 80 per cent of dot-coms that should fail are going to fail fairly rapidly now. What we've got to be looking for are the 20 per cent that still deserve to succeed." Rene Carayol, ex-IT director at IPC, wants the investment community to show more financial prudence in the future and build upon the 20 per cent of success stories. Carayol said: "Do you need to have spent £80 million whilst people realise 'perhaps this ain't going to work out'?" Sally Watson, silicon's e-technology editor, agreed the market can now distinguish between business models that do and do not work online. She said to bear in mind that this is what happens in the real world, where numerous start-ups across all sectors also fail. She added: "I think companies starting up this year will be more serious and will have been in the game a lot longer. They will have learnt the lessons of boo.com." The panel also discussed the UK government's review of major IT projects launched this week. Behind the Headlines can be viewed today in silicon.com's Retail channel.