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The Marketer (Ted Leonsis)

Doerr: No, because Amazon's investing heavily to build their brand. Amazon's caused me to triple my book-buying budget. Friends like Marc Andreessen, Bill Gates and Bill Joy all complain (kiddingly) that Amazon's caused them to buy more books than ever before. On the other hand, Jerry Kaplan's OnSale.com auction is profitable. And Mark Andreessen and the Netscapers made 9 million dollars profit last quarter on a hundred million in revenue. That's less than two years after first commercial release.

Brockman: Future of Netscape?

Doerr: Forrester Research forecasts the enterprise intranet market they address will be $10 billion in 2000. Who will get 40% share? 60% share? Netscape? Microsoft? A new player?

Ever since December 5, 1995, the trade press and industry insiders have believed Microsoft will drive Netscape out of business. Microsoft is an able and fierce competitor, who I admire a lot. Their monopoly in operating systems gives them lots of advantages. But The Net is such a large opportunity, its not likely to be a zero-sum game or binary outcome.

Brockman: So is this so-called "browser war" a non-event?

Doerr: Hardly. Browsers, or clients, (soon to be "communicators") accounted for 60% of Netscape's revenue last quarter. So last quarter it was a $60 million dollar "non-event"? The battle is about browsers, but also about servers, APIs, object models, open directory standards, platform choice, and above all, new function.

The battle between Microsoft, the industry's more powerful company and Netscape may be the most titanic battle for market share we ever witness. Bigger than Coke vs. Pepsi. With far greater consequences. But bear in mind, in the heat of the battle, that the size of the opportunity - $10 billion in 2000 - overwhelms the ability of either Netscape or Microsoft to serve the market need.