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NORTH PALM BEACH, FLA. -- May 1, 2000
-- Bankrate Inc. (NASDAQ: ILIF) today named Elisabeth DeMarse president
and chief executive officer of Bankrate Inc. and its leading bankrate.com
brand. DeMarse joins Bankrate Inc. from Hoover’s Inc., which owns
and operates Hoover’s Online, where she most recently served as executive
vice president of international operations. Previously, she was a group
executive at Bloomberg L.P., where, as a member of the executive management
team, she helped grow the company to $1.5 billion from $50 million in
revenue.
"The CEO appointment of such a prominent business information
leader as Elisabeth is a milestone in the strategic re-alignment of Bankrate
Inc.’s business," said Jeff Cunningham, chairman of the board
of directors. "Elisabeth relishes the challenge of building Bankrate
Inc. into a profitable Internet company and leveraging its brands on the
Internet and beyond. Her extensive experience with building and running
both financial services and Internet businesses will be key to developing
our core strengths in delivering targeted advertising, sponsorships and
e-commerce transactions in the personal finance markets."
Ms. DeMarse joins the company just as Bankrate Inc. delivers
record revenues and record traffic. The company recently announced revenue
of $3,931,000 in the first quarter of 2000, up 77% from $2,226,000 in
the first quarter of 1999. Online publishing revenue grew 120% from the
comparable quarter last year and represented 77% of total revenues in
the recent first quarter, compared to 62% in the first quarter of 1999.
In addition, the company recently added two key appointments to its board
of directors: Jeff Cunningham, formerly of Forbes and CMGI, and Bill Martin,
founder of Alta Vista’s Raging Bull.
"I look forward to leading Bankrate Inc. and its family
of sites at this pivotal time," said Ms. DeMarse. "With its
diversified revenue streams, increasing traffic metrics and exceptional
team dedicated to creating new revenue opportunities, Bankrate Inc. is
poised to lead the coming wave of Internet banking services. Bankrate
Inc.’s loyal user base, combined with the site’s targeted approach,
already yields one of the highest CPM’s of any personal finance Web
site, and we will devote ourselves to growing this targeted category.
The banking sector is ready to explode on the Web in the coming year,
particularly with the new emphasis on savings, interest rates, and value
spending. It will soon engage a large, online commerce-oriented demographic
that is substantially larger than the standalone stock trader demographic
previously synonymous with the finance category. With a renewed focus
on our core bankrate.com site, we will produce a very successful and profitable
Internet business."
"Elisabeth’s creativity, enthusiasm and experience
in our market adds a new dimension to Bankrate Inc. that our entire team
feels is the key ingredient to achieving the incredible financial promise
of this business," said Cotter Cunningham, former interim CEO, who
will now hold the position of senior vice president - marketing &
product development.
DeMarse worked with Hoover’s, Inc., the successful
businessperson’s portal, since February 1999. Prior to Hoover's,
she spent ten years at Bloomberg L.P. in a leadership position where she
led the start-up of eight businesses and founded Bloomberg's e-commerce
and
i-commerce divisions. At Bloomberg, she arranged more than
20 major deals and new business ventures and redefined the company’s
brand to extend beyond professional financial services to a broader range
of personal service offerings. Prior to Bloomberg, she served four years
at Citibank's Information Business, and four and one half years at Western
Union marketing telecommunications services.
DeMarse holds an AB with Honors from Wellesley College where
she majored in History and an MBA from Harvard with an emphasis on Marketing.
About Bankrate Inc.
Based in North Palm Beach, Fla., Bankrate Inc. (NASDAQ: ILIF) is an industry
leader in providing and syndicating personal finance infrastructure for
the online consumer public through a broad portfolio of demographically
targeted Web sites, print publications and broadcast segments. The company's
leading personal finance site, bankrate.com, features original content
that deals with financial planning, taxes, insurance, investing and banking.
Our gateway site, www.Bankrate Inc. serves as an introduction to Bankrate
Inc.'s family of Web sites, including the award-winning bankrate.com,
Pivot.com (insurance e-commerce – www.pivot.com), theWhiz.com (planning
content – www.thewhiz.com), Bankrate.com Taxes (tax planning –
www.intelligenttaxes.com), Consejero.com, (Spanish-language personal finance
–) CPNet.com (college lifestyle – www.cpnet.com) and GreenMagazine.com
(investing – www.greenmagazine.com). Content from Bankrate Inc. is
published on co-branded Internet sites through more than 120 distributors,
including Snap (NASDAQ: NBCI), Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO), America Online (NYSE:
AOL), CNN and Smart Money. The company's original research is also distributed
through more than 120 national and state publications. Bankrate Inc. sites
have approximately one million unique visitors per month, according to
Media Metrix.
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