At PikeNet: Survivors wanted.

It didn't take much to get some attending last week's PikeNet Expo at the Hilton. Midtown to vocalize the question of the day: How many of the real estate dot-corns pitching business models at the expo would be "dot-gone" in six months?

"It's going to be interesting to see who's standing at the next PikeNet conference," said iScraper president Philip Wharton, who prefaced his comments by acknowledging the taboo nature of the subject.

Wharton's company is among the scores of new dot-coms and other technology-based companies that have flooded the real estate industry in the past few months. Initially the new companies were offering the same services offered by traditional real estate companies, in an effort to eliminate the "middleman." Those companies, however, met with resistance in the industry among brokers and others and quickly disbanded.

"That idea's out the window. It happened with books, it happened with airline tickets, but it's not going to happen with real estate," said Peter Pike, president of PikeNet, which organized the expo.

As a result, many new enterprises have shifted their business focuses and are now offering services aimed at enhancing those offered by traditional real estate companies. By using the Internet and other technology, new companies are hoping to offer traditional companies ways to maximize their efficiency and reduce costs.

In an industry most view as fragmented and inefficient, there seems to be plenty of room for new enterprises that use technology effectively. It is clear, however, that the marketplace cannot sustain the high number of new businesses that have been introduced in recent months, therefore making consolidation and attrition inevitable.

"There is an increasing realization that the only way a dot-coin can survive is to align themselves with traditional real estate services. Nobody knows how that mix will end up," Pike said.

At the Pike Net expo, there were 100 exhibitors offering services in traditional real estate sectors such as leasing, research, and property management and there are hundreds of other technology-based companies offering similar services that weren't present at the expo. There are other companies that are "in stealth mode," but are planning to launch new initiatives soon.

Although PikeNet has held conferences -- the last one was held this past spring in San Francisco -- last week's event was the first trade show held by the group. Pike said the idea behind the show was to provide the industry with hands-on demonstrations of product offerings to help executives make sense of them.

"Everybody in the industry is having trouble understanding the business models that exist," he said.

While existing companies occupied the bulk of the booth space, there were some companies that used the expo to introduce new initiatives. New York-based RexOffice.com launched a new Internet portal designed to function as a building operating system. It provides small- and mid-sized businesses with access to services on the Internet that simplify day-to-day operations. It is being offered as a building amenity by landlords of city buildings such as the Daily News Building, the Woolworth Building, and 787 at Equitable Center, according to RexOffice.

"It's a great tool to help foster a sense of community within the building," said Polly O'Brien, vice president of Lend Lease Real Estate Investments, owners of 787 Seventh Ave. "Our building manager is happy to have a better means of communicating with our resident businesses and our tenants now feel they're receiving some of the advantages that were previously restricted to their larger competitors."

Seattle-based URReal.com launched its new Live Tour service, which offers "virtual tours" of commercial and residential property over the Internet. The service allows brokers, homeowners and others to view properties without leaving the office. It also allows people in different geographic locations to view a property jointly over the Internet.

To assist real estate executives in deciding which companies have the business models, capital, talent and vision to survive, Ernst & Young's Kenneth Leventhal Real Estate Group released the new "Guide to the Real Estate Super Highway." The publication is a compilation of technology businesses that provide services aimed at enhancing services in traditional real estate categories, including transactions, customer/tenant services, asset and property management, development and construction, facilities management, and financing.

"These are not simply Internet versions of traditional real estate companies. These are technology driven enterprises that are transforming the real estate marketplace," said Dale Anne Reiss, global industry leader of real estate and construction for Ernst & Young LLP.

In between product demonstrations at the expo, it was common for companies to boast about profitability and "longevity." One PikeNet organizer joked that he wanted to ask each exhibiting business whether it had a revenue stream and, if it did, whether it had profits.

Jonathon Antevy, chief executive officer of Boca Raton-based eBuilder.net, opened his ten-minute presentation by mentioning that the company was seven years old and had been profitable since 1998.

"We don't have a burn rate," he said. "You want to look for the trust factor in selecting a company to do business. You want to work with somebody who's going to be around."

For the companies that do survive, Pike is planning to hold another expo next fall in New York. He acknowledged that the second expo is likely to bear little resemblance to the first.

"The players will all be different," he said.