B2B Player Armadillo Gets Cash From BDO
By Lee Buchanan - HFN

HIGH POINT, N.C.-Armadillo.com, a home furnishings business-to-business e-commerce company, received $1 million and a vote of confidence from BDO Seidman, the leading accounting firm in the furniture industry.

Armadillo and a host of business-to-business (B2B) players - including HomePoint.com, Exclaim Technologies, RetailMetro, FurnishNet.com and FurnitureShow.com - are hustling hard at market this week to get vendors on board.

"BDO Seidman has never before invested in any kind of online B2B play, has never before invested in a financial product for the furniture industry, has never aligned themselves with a product that will be used by many of their clients, said retail guru J'Amy Owens. "To get their vote of confidence this way, by making an investment in Armadillo, is unprecedented, " she said. "It's market-making for Armadillo. It's the best seal of approval we could have hoped for." Armadillo was unveiled at October's High Point market by Owens and her Seattle-based company, The Retail Group. Owens bills Armadillo as a comprehensive e-commerce solution that streamlines B2B functions between manufacturers and retailers. The concept would also provide retailers with a cost-efficient entry into e-commerce to consumers. "Since last market we've been raising money, forming strategic alliances, recruiting senior management and talking to customers," Owens said.

Armadillo isn't live yet, but Owens said the pieces are in place, including partnerships with Microsoft, Sun MicroSystems and MarketMax, a provider of e-commerce merchandising software. The Armadillo system will incorporate database-management technology from Oracle. KPMG will provide Internet consulting, Owens said. The next step: getting key manufacturers and retailers to sign up. "We are having very high-level conversations with the biggest players in the industry," Owens said. "We hope to have announcements soon regarding major alliances with several key manufacturers." Among retailers, Armadillo has signed the 2,200 members of the Home Furnishings International Association, Owens said. B2B companies see this week's market as a key opportunity to forge alliances with top manufacturers to provide an Internet- based flow of information between retailer and vendor. And they will all be pounding the pavement in High Point, pitching their solutions to the furniture industry: several such alliances are expected to be announced during market. Unlike some other B2B models, Armadillo seeks to be a behind- the-scenes solution, linking manufacturers and retailers -and ultimately consumers - while maintaining the industry's current distribution system.

"It really is about industry credibility. Fundamentally, our role is very different from other B2B companies," Owens said. "Armadillo exists to help manufacturers and retailers build their brands--not be the brand," she said.

B2B has been the recent focus of efforts to bring home furnishings into the e-commerce age. HomePoint.com, perhaps the leading player early in the B2B race, recently abandoned its business- to-consumer effort to concentrate on a B2B solution through its Advantage Network.

Other B2B contenders have recently set up shop in High Point, including Exclaim Technologies, RetailMetro and FurnishNet.com. While B2B will get a lot of buzz at market this week, the industry will keep an eye on Wall Street to see how Furniture.com's IPO fares. Fumiture.com was one of the first e-commerce companies to stake a claim to the home furnishings business, and now the company is poised to be the first furnishings e-tailer to go public.