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eBay, Yahoo Japan team up services

Yahoo Japan Corp and eBay Inc agreed yesterday to team up in online auctions, planning services for next year that will make it easier for consumers to buy things over the Internet from the US and Japan.

The move marks a return to Japan of eBay, which pulled out of the market in 2002, never able to compete against the domination of Yahoo.

Yahoo said by March, Japanese will be able to bid for items up for sale on eBay through the Yahoo auction site in Japan.

By the middle of next year, a site will be set up to allow Americans to buy Yahoo Japan auction items through the eBay site.

The deal will facilitate "cross-border trading" and invigorate the online auction market, Yahoo said in a statement.

"We are excited to partner with Yahoo Japan in providing Japanese users with localized site designed to enable them to shop on the eBay marketplace with ease and convenience," eBay chief executive Meg Whitman said in a statement.

SEKAIMON

EBay and Yahoo Japan -- collaborating for the first time -- also launched a separate Web site called Sekaimon, which means "global shopping" in Japanese.

The Sekaimon site will translate items on listed on eBay into Japanese and help with payments, shipping and customs clearance for Japanese shoppers, both sides said.

Revenue from Sekaimon will be shared, they said, while not disclosing the terms.

Yahoo Japan is a unit of Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo Inc, has more than 15 million auction items listed on any given day, while eBay, based in San Jose, California, the world's biggest online auction site, boasts 248 million registered users.

The online auction markets in both countries are growing, Yahoo said. In Japan, it's up about 27 percent from a year ago to an estimated ¥4 trillion (US$36.4 billion) and in the US, it's up 21 percent to more than ¥19 trillion.

FRENCH LAWSUIT

In related news, France's auction houses said on Monday they were taking joint legal action against eBay, accusing it of encouraging trade in pirated and stolen goods.

The council representing the French auction industry accuses the Internet trader of breaking a French 2000 law that requires all auctioneers to be approved by the state.

"Above and beyond the unfair competition," it said, eBay's situation "is leading to a rising number of goods being auctioned without regard for the law on public sales."

The council accused eBay of failing to uphold rules designed to protect consumers and combat tax evasion and the trade of counterfeit and stolen goods.

`UNFOUNDED' CLAIM

The US firm issued a statement rejecting the lawsuit as "totally unfounded," saying it was not concerned by the law in question.

"EBay's activities and those of the auctioneers are totally separate, as stated by the law, and as we have regularly reminded the council since eBay started trading in France," it said.

A spokesman for the online giant said the Web site acted as an "auction broker" that "facilitates meetings between buyers and sellers."

Its activities "do not constitute a public auction," he said.
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