Best Western Chooses Vicinity to Turn Web Site Guests into Hotel Guests.Business Editors/High-Tech Writers PALO ALTO Palo Alto, city, California Palo Alto (păl`ō ăl`tō), city (1990 pop. 55,900), Santa Clara co., W Calif.; inc. 1894. Although primarily residential, Palo Alto has aerospace, electronics, and advanced research industries. , Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 30, 2000 Vicinity's Business Finder(SM) Drives Customers from www.bestwestern.com to Nearest Brick-and-Mortar Hotel Location Responding to customer demand for increased convenience in travel planning, Vicinity Corp. (Nasdaq:VCNT), a leader in Internet-based marketing infrastructure services, today announced that it will provide Business Finder(SM) capabilities for all Best Western properties. "Vicinity is the best choice for companies doing business in the click-and-mortar arena, and specifically, for its sophisticated, private-label Business Finder technology that maintains the Best Western brand," said Mary Beth Knight, managing director of intermediary marketing for Best Western. "Vicinity was unique in the level of support, hosting, reliability and scalability that we needed to manage thousands of locations worldwide, and for our continued growth in the future." With Vicinity's Business Finder, visitors to the Best Western Web site (www.bestwestern.com) can find the nearest location of the world's largest hotel brand including accommodation information, detailed driving directions and step-by-step maps for some 4,000 properties across 12 countries in North America North America, third largest continent (1990 est. pop. 365,000,000), c.9,400,000 sq mi (24,346,000 sq km), the northern of the two continents of the Western Hemisphere. and Europe. By selecting "Hotel Quick Search" on the Best Western home page, Web site visitors can search by city and state to obtain a list of nearby hotels with links to specific property pages, maps, driving directions and detailed hotel information, such as rates and reservation policies, hotel amenities and local weather information. Web site visitors also have the option to select hotels within a certain distance from a city center as well as view their selections on a customized map, with each Best Western location plotted on the map. Trip Planner allows users to enter any starting point Noun 1. starting point - earliest limiting point terminus a quo commencement, get-go, offset, outset, showtime, starting time, beginning, start, kickoff, first - the time at which something is supposed to begin; "they got an early start"; "she knew from the and final destination and subsequently plots the entire route with all the Best Western locations along the way. "Successful businesses need to have both a strong online and offline presence, and we are thrilled to be bridging those worlds for Best Western," said Emerick Woods, chief executive officer and president of Vicinity Corporation. "Best Western is the newest hotel partner to join our travel portfolio, which includes brands such as Alamo Alamo Eighteenth-century mission in San Antonio, Texas, site of a historic siege of a small group of Texans by a Mexican army (1836) during the Texas war for independence from Mexico. Rent-A-Car, British Airways British Airways in full British Airways PLC International passenger airline based in London. In 1936 British Airways Ltd. was founded through the merger of three smaller airlines. , Rand McNally Rand McNally & Company is the preeminent American publisher of maps, atlases, and globes for travel, reference, commercial, and educational uses. It also provides online consumer street maps and directions, as well as commercial transportation routing software and mileage data. and Preview Travel." About Best Western Best Western International is the world's largest hotel chain with more than 4,000 hotels in 84 countries and territories. It is a membership association of independently owned and operated hotels that provides marketing, reservations and operational support to its member hotels. About Vicinity Corp. Vicinity Corp. is a leading provider of Internet-based marketing infrastructure services for brand-name Global 2000 companies and the No. 1 business-to-business site for June and July 2000 according to Media Metrix. The company's clicks-and-mortar solutions, available in 14 countries and in 10 languages, enable its approximately 370 clients to direct consumers searching for a specific product or service to the nearest brick-and-mortar store that carries that product or service. Vicinity's customers include FedEx, Ford, GM, Hilton Hotels Corp., Marriott, McDonald's, NEC (NEC Corporation, Tokyo, www.nec.com, www.necus.com) An electronics conglomerate known in the U.S. for its monitors. In Japan, it had the lion's share of the PC market until the late 1990s (see PC 98). NEC was founded in Tokyo in 1899 as Nippon Electric Company, Ltd. , Pizza Hut, Starbucks, Starwood Hotels, Taco Bell, Toyota, Levi Strauss & Co. and UPS. Its suite of private-label and co-branded content and services -- available via the Internet, cellular phones, WAP phones, PDAs, wireless devices and landline telephones -- includes Vicinity Business Finder(SM), Telephone Business Finder(SM), Wireless Business Finder(SM), BrandFinder(SM), SiteMaker(SM), MailMaker(SM), GeoSearch(R), MapBlast!(R) Syndication Services, and Business Directory. Publicly traded on Nasdaq under the symbol VCNT, Vicinity's investors include CMGI CMGI Commonly Maintained Grounds Infrastructures CMGI College Marketing Group Information (Services) (Nasdaq:CMGI). Vicinity's strategic alliances include Verizon, AT&T, Palm, OmniSky, OracleMobile, AltaVista, Lycos and Inktomi (Nasdaq:INKT INKT Inktomi, Inc. (stock abbreviation, AMEX) INKT I Never Knew That ), and it is a member of the Phone.com (Nasdaq:PHCM PHCM Master Chief Photographer's Mate (Naval Rating) ) Alliance Program. Vicinity was established in 1995, is headquartered in Palo Alto, and has offices in New Hampshire New Hampshire, one of the New England states of the NE United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts (S), Vermont, with the Connecticut R. forming the boundary (W), the Canadian province of Quebec (NW), and Maine and a short strip of the Atlantic Ocean (E). , France, Germany and the U.K. Vicinity(R)is a registered trademark of Vicinity Corp. |
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