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Excite@Home cuts again
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April 30, 2001: 3:20 p.m. ET
Internet service and content provider slashes 13% of staff
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - High-speed Internet service and content provider Excite@Home Corp. on Monday said it is laying off 380 employees, or roughly 13 percent of its total work force.
The bulk of the cuts will come from the company's media division, through which it operates its Excite.com Web portal, a company spokeswoman said. She added that all of the affected employees would be notified by the end of the day.
The Redwood City, Calif.-based firm already laid off 250 workers in January. When the company reported its latest quarterly results last week, executives said that more job cuts were likely.
Excite@Home derives its revenue from subscriptions to its high-speed Internet service as well as from advertising sales through its Excite.com Web portal. That unit has been a drag on earnings in recent quarters amid a sharp slowdown in the online advertising market.
When the company reported its first-quarter results, it reported a loss that was even wider than executives had told the Street to expect when they warned of a quarterly shortfall just a week earlier.
Those officials pinned the blame for the miss squarely on the poor performance of the media business, which has proven to be a financial burden for the company.
Excite@Home has been considering selling off its Excite.com portal and other portions of the media business as one of its options to deal with a cash crunch, but executives have said they cannot be certain when or if that will happen. The company earlier this month said it is aiming to raise $75 million to $85 million cash.
The company also recently named a new chief executive officer.
In the current quarter, the company said it expects revenue growth to stall, then resume in the second half.
Shares of Excite@Home (ATHM: down $0.17 to $3.82, Research, Estimates) fell sharply in afternoon Nasdaq trade Monday. 
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