BUSINESSWEEK ONLINE : OCTOBER 23, 2000 ISSUE
BUSINESS WEEK E.BIZ -- SPECIAL REPORT Re-editing IFILM Kevin Wendle has seen his share of entertainment startups. In the mid-'80s, he developed shows such as In Living Color that helped launch Fox Broadcasting (FOX). Nearly a decade later, he was among those who started the online technology news site CNET. So, not long after making a small investment in entertainment site IFILM in early 1999, Wendle could tell the Web site, which featured quirky, sometimes sex-filled shorts, was lumbering toward failure. ''There were 30 others just like them out there, and I wasn't sure how we were going to be all that different,'' he says. Wendle figured out a way. After pumping more than $5 million of his own money into the company, and taking over as CEO, Wendle has pushed IFILM through the most dramatic remake of any Hollywood dot-com. Since March, the 42-year-old executive has bought six Web companies, turning the site from a virtual cineplex into one of Hollywood's first business-to-business sites, offering industry players the ability to find scripts and props and to chat one another up. And in September, he almost pulled off Hollywood's biggest Net deal yet, coming within a few days of taking control of pop.com, the star-crossed content site backed by Paul Allen and DreamWorks. The negotiations with pop.com established IFILM as a likely survivor in the fast-collapsing lineup of Hollywood sites. That's largely because the company posts film shorts for free to drive traffic and lure Hollywood types to its IFILMPro site. There, it charges subscription fees of up to $35,000 a pop for such services as tracking the production and commercial progress of films and TV shows. IFILM also sells advertising for its newly launched portal, which gives consumers Hollywood news. And there's a new service to assemble online focus groups to test electronic trailers and gauge marketing efforts. ''If we can give the industry the tools it needs to do business, we can become indispensable,'' says IFILM Chairman Skip Paul, a former Universal Studios executive whom Wendle recruited in November. The new plan is working. Since the site's relaunch this spring, traffic has grown five-fold, says Wendle, to 700,000 unique users. IFILM has had its hits, too, most recently a 58-second thriller about an airliner landing on a freeway, called 405. It was downloaded more than 1 million times in its first six weeks. More important for IFILM's standing with creative types, the short got the two computer graphic artists who made it a contract with talent agency Creative Artists Agency Inc. That's one way to build a following. By Ronald Grover _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ BACK TO TOP					RELATED ITEMS EBIZ Contents for issue dated Oct. 23, 2000 HollyWeb Flops TABLE: Retakes Babes in Broadband Re-editing IFILM INTERACT E-Mail to Business Week Online

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