March 21, 1997 6:15 PM ET
Zona predicts $100 billion in Net business by 2000
By Renee Deger

The millennium will be very, very good to the Internet. Zona Research Inc. expects the Internet/intranet market to total $100 billion in the year 2000, 181 percent higher than last year's $35.6 billion. The Redwood, Calif.-based research company will release these numbers at its Zonathon '97 conference in Cambridge, Mass., next Wednesday. Zona's Internet/intranet market measure is expanding on the traditional way to define the Internet/intranet markets by simply estimating how many products would be sold, said Harry Fenik, a Zona vice president. During Zonathon '97, analysts will detail the six major industries, including hardware and services, that combined will total $100 billion by the year 2000. The six links in Zona's "info-chain" are creation, content, containment (or storage), communication, consumption and control. "We decided we need a framework, to look at the market not from the perspective of how many boxes are being sold, but what's really going on--the motion of product capabilities," said Fenik. Content, for example, is one of the industries that will see great change, driven by how people use the Internet or intranet, rather than what new and static information is posted, said Fenik. He predicts content will be centered on elaborate and detailed databases. Information will be delivered by "smart" systems able to determine by past habits or a user profile what people need when they reach a site. "It will be a combination of what you asked and what the computer knows about you," said Fenik. The content market totaled $3.86 billion in 1996, but it will increase to $12.9 billion by 2000, the report predicts. The builders of the infrastructure will earn the most money by far in the growth of the Internet and intranet markets, according to the Zona report. Zona will report that the communication market, defined as access providers and builders of the infrastructure components, will increase 47 percent by 2000, from $20.3 billion last year to $62.7 billion. Another significant growth area, although the capital levels will be lower, is the containment industry, or companies providing maintenance and storage, the report stated. Zona predicts the industry to grow 85 percent to $15.3 billion by 2000 from its 1996 level of $7 billion. Copyright(c) 1997 Ziff-Davis Publishing Company. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Ziff-Davis Publishing Company is prohibited. PC Week and the PC Week logo are trademarks of Ziff-Davis Publishing Company. PC Week Online and the PC Week Online logo are trademarks of Ziff-Davis Publishing Company. Send mail to PC Week