Amazon.Com Raises Size, Price Of Ipo

Amazon.com Inc. bumped up the size and price of its initial public offering, a sign of healthy demand for shares in the Internet book seller.

The Seattle-based company plans to sell 3 million common shares at $14 to $16 each, according to a regulatory filing. Amazon.com initially planned to sell 2.5 million shares for $12 to $14 each.

The pending IPO has attracted considerable interest because Amazon.com is one of the first companies to successfully exploit the Internet as a medium for commerce. The company offers more than 2.5 million titles over the global computer network and describes itself as the Earth’s biggest bookstore.

Such claims have led Barnes & Noble Inc. to slap Amazon.com with a lawsuit and set up a rival Internet site for selling books. However, the threat of competition from a much larger rival - Barnes & Noble had annual sales of about $2.45 billion during its last fiscal year - hasn’t dulled investor demand for Amazon.com stock.

“There is very strong institutional interest in this offering,” said Ryan Jacob, director of research at IPO Value Monitor, a New York-based institutional research service.