The Dot-Com Companies That Went Bust—and the Few That Survived

Fueled by rapid stock market growth, the “dot-com” era is widely remembered as a period when the World Wide Web became a household name. During this period, money was quite literally being thrown at new companies, all of whom hoped to become the next big thing in Silicon Valley or elsewhere.

Unfortunately, the dot-com era was also marked by market turmoil and the drying up of capital. While the stock market performed very well between 1995 and 2000, the bear market between 2000 and 2002 is well known for being a period when internet companies that were once darlings of the business world all but disappeared.

15. Survived: SanDisk

While SanDisk was founded in 1998, it was in 2000 that the company began to focus on flash memory, which it is now one of the most prominent suppliers of. Thankfully, SanDisk survived the dot-com bubble and likely manufactures the storage card you have used in every camera, tablet, and smartphone. 

14. Survived: Priceline.com

Beginning operations in 1998, Priceline.com initially allowed users to name their own price for airfare, a business model that made it wildly successful. Priceline didn’t suffer too much from the dot-com bubble and more from the standstill in travel after September 11th. 

13. Survived: Yahoo!

It’s hard to say that Yahoo! “Survived” the dot-com bubble, considering it’s taken a backseat to Google in the search world. Still, the company’s stock price rose astronomically when it was the biggest search engine in the world. It even had a chance to take over Google for $1 million but declined. 

12. Survived: Amazon

Even though Amazon suffered greatly during the dot-com bubble, its share price dropped from around $100 to $10. Today, Amazon is one of the largest companies in the world, behind Apple, Google, and Microsoft. Amazon’s diverse product offering and focus on operational efficiency undoubtedly helped the company weather poor financials. 

11. Survived: eBay

Founded in 1995, eBay remains one of the world’s most popular and most visited online auction sites. eBay not only weathered the dot-com bubble but thrived as it expanded into new markets as other companies shut down operations. 

10. Bust: Inside.com

With a ton of hype around its launch, Inside.com was billed as “the converging worlds of entertainment, media, music, and technology.” Sadly, the site was a victim of the dot-com bubble burst. Even with a deeply talented staff and industry talent, funding dried up as venture capitalists closed their wallets. This was before websites heavily relied on ad revenue from companies like Google. 

9. Bust: Flooz.com

Famously touted by Whoopi Goldberg as the company spokesperson, Flooz.com was an early concept of alternative payment methods other than cash and charge. You could use Flooz at companies like Delta and Barnes & Noble. Although it raised tens of millions, the company was a casualty of the dot-com bubble bursting and shut down after just under two years of operations. 

8. Bust: Webvan

Webcam, an early grocery business that was a big part of the dot-com bust, only survived for three years before the party ended. Offering service in ten cities around the US, at one point, this company, started by Borders Books CEO Louis Borders, was valued at over $1 billion. Sadly, poor management led to the company losing hundreds of millions of dollars and it shut down in 2001. 

7. Bust: theGlobe.com

At one point, theGlobe.com was one of the most successful IPOs in history before crashing down. An early social networking site, theGlobe.com is a poster child of a company that once exploded in value and user base before the dot-com decline began. TheGlobe.com was simply a casualty of the market shifting away from excessive millionaire CEOs, of which theGlobe.com was a participant. 

6. Bust: Gadzoox

At one point, Gadzoox was a one-time dot-com unicorn that focused heavily on data storage and serving other brands of the dot-com era. Valued at over $2 billion in 2000, the company saw both its CEO and CFO leave after it indicated financial troubles. By 2003, the billion-dollar party was over, and the company sold itself off to Broadcom. 

5. Bust: Excite

Excite was once one of the biggest search engines on the Internet. It was so big that it could have acquired Google for $1 million in 1999. However, Excite turned down Google’s technology, and as a result, the company began to lose market share behind AOL and Yahoo, forcing it to close down in 2001. 

4. Bust: Go.com

One of the most forgotten Disney sites in company history, Go.com, was created in 1998 to compete with AOL and Yahoo. However, Disney struggled to grow the site, likely because it featured more adult content than the Disney brand was used to, which meant leaving kids out entirely. As a result, Disney shut the site down three years later and wrote the entire thing off. 

3. Bust: GeoCities

If you were online during the dot-com days, you had your own GeoCities site. Before MySpace, GeoCities was the Las Vegas of the internet, with flashy web pages that could light up an entire room. For a time, it was the third most visited site in the world before being purchased by Yahoo in 1999, only to be sold off in 2009. 

2. Bust: eToys.com

Another famous example of a dot-com darling that went from boom to bust is eToys.com. This company was the most visited website during the holiday season and spent millions competing with Toys R Us. However, the company was said to have spent too aggressively trying to compete and it eventually closed after losing $75 million in the fourth quarter of 2000. 

1. Bust: Pets.com

Of all the dot-com companies that went bust, pets.com might be the most famous example. After losing $147 million in just nine months in 2000, the company’s business model was famously flawed. It failed to bring down costs to ship its most popular products, such as dog food. Ultimately, its stock fell below 22 cents per share, and the company closed in November 2000, forcing it to lay off 300 people.

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