Consultancies’ dotcom fatigue

The downswing in fortune of dotcom companies such as Boo.com and Last Minute.com is already taking its toll on branding and identity projects by design consultancies.

Last week Ernst & Young’s Internet Incubator chief executive Martin Bodenham went on record saying that more than 50 per cent of business plans which have already been negotiated were being reassessed by financiers following the collapse of e-commerce websites Boo.com and Net Imperative.

According to C Eye director Mark Pinder, design projects are already being put on hold. “I doubt whether anybody else would admit it, but I’m sure there are a number of consultancies that have felt the effects of the downturn.

“We were in the middle of two branding projects and these have just been put on hold because the client was worried by the Boo.com situation. Fortunately for us, it is only a small part of the business,” he adds.

Asked about the cause of the problem Pinder says it is mainly instigated by the investors.

In Bodenham’s estimation 25 per cent of deals at the Ernst & Young incubator have now been shelved while just 25 per cent remain unaffected as a result.

The re-assessment comes after a 20 per cent decline in the value of the Nasdaq stock market over the past two months.