On-line Banking: Bowne Buys Control of Web Site Designer

Bowne & Co., the New York-based financial printing company, has acquired 80% of Quadravision Communications Ltd. of Toronto, a designer of Internet sites for several prominent financial institutions.

Quadravision's management retained 20% ownership, and its president, John Long, is to head Bowne's Internet operations worldwide. Other terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Quadravision's customers include Fleet Financial Group, Bank of Montreal's Mbanx division, Thomas Cook Group, Scudder Funds of Canada, and New York Life Insurance Co.

Bowne concurrently announced its acquisition of 100% of Sitewerks Inc., a Seattle-based Web development company allied with Microsoft Corp.

The two purchases will help Bowne extend its document processing and distribution capabilities onto the World Wide Web, said the company's chairman and chief executive officer, Robert M. Johnson.

"Quadravision and Sitewerks are natural fits for our vision of enabling clients to meet the global information demands of the coming decades," Mr. Johnson said. His company had previously acquired the Internet Factory of Detroit, a leading Internet services provider to the auto industry.

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