BUSINESS: Firms wise up to potential of Web

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Aardman Animation has received orders worth more than pounds 200,000 since its Wallace and Gromit site on the Internet's World Wide Web was set up in 1995 - boosting claims by the Electronic Commerce Association (ECA) that the Web will be a major money-spinner. Some large companies already produce 5 per cent of revenue using the Web, which was devised in 1991 at the headquarters of Cern, the European atomic research laboratory. By 2000 the figure will be about 20 per cent, says the ECA, based in London.

National Express's Web site has sold pounds 50,000 worth of tickets, of which 80 per cent have gone to overseas customers. The ECA comments: "The Internet is helping to level the playing field between large and small companies." It also forecasts that electronic commerce will grow by 50 per cent annually, reaching about $150bn by 2002, while the number of businesses accessing the Web will rise from 1. million at the end of 1997 to 8 million by 2001. Much of this growth is forecast to happen in the Pacific Rim countries and Europe.