For technology decision-makers looking for software that will underpin their organisation’s business-to-business (B2B) initiatives, the choice of software vendors is thinning out rapidly.

July 2002 saw the demise of UK-based catalogue management software company Cataloga and B2B exchange platform company Izodia (formerly Infobank). “Both vendors had good software applications, but the scope was arguably and confusingly too broad for Izodia and too niche for Cataloga,” concludes Beth Barling, an analyst at market research company AMR Research.

August 2002, meanwhile, saw e-procurement software company Clarus closing down its Maidenhead-based UK operations – although the company still has a skeleton staff manning its Limerick, Ireland-based customer support facility. Originally a mid-market enterprise resource planning software vendor, Clarus’s heyday was back in1998, when revenues hit a once-in-a-lifetime high of $41.6 million. But the arguably rash sell-off of its financial and human resources software to Geac, followed by a hazardous move into e-procurement platform clearly did not pay off. A further blow was the decision by UK-based independent trading exchange BarclaysB2B to close its operations. Clarus continues to operate from its Suwanee, Georgia headquarters in the US.