The founders of Microsoft Corp’s latest acquistion, Netcarta Corp (CI No 3,061) may well be wondering how they ended up under Redmond’s wing after only two years in business. Netcarta’s vice president of marketing Thomas Tansy, and chief technology officer Dr Randall Stark, founded the company in 1994, originally as Nice Technologies Inc, before selling it to CMG Information Services Inc in August 1995, when it was moved to Scotts Valley, California and renamed NetCarta. The company specializes in providing Web site management software, that enables users to manage and control Web sites. Netcarta Webmapper version 2.0, released last week, provides tools for visualizing the schema of sites, mapping, to enable management of hypertext-linked Webs, managing content, and a suite of reports to enable in depth analysis of every aspect of a site. It offers powerful search capabilities to enable managers to locate any information about site objects by searching on criteria such as load size, text strings, author. Version 2.0 offers two types of site view, a traditional tree-type view of the pages and links, and Netcarta’s Cyberbolic view, which the company says enables users to see the big picture, like studying a blueprint. Webmapper runs on Windows 3.51 or later, 95 and NT, and Unix versions include Sun Microsystems Inc’s Solaris, Silicon Graphics Inc Irix and Hewlett-Packard Co HP-UX. In October, the company announced an agreement with IBM Corp to incorporate Webmapper into IBM’s AS/400 Web Server-in-a-Box Internet offering. There is no news yet on what will happen to Netcarta’s 50 staff now the company has been swallowed by the giant, but it seems Microsoft will incorporate Webmapper into its BackOffice Groupware suite.