In what is by far the largest pledge of venture capital to an Internet-based company targeting the meeting industry, investors signed a deal giving PlanSoft $24 million, bringing the Cleveland-based company's total invested capital to $40 million.

"Wall Street and Silicon Valley have been looking at business-to-consumer ventures for the past few years," says David Hunt, CEO of PlanSoft. "The hottest thing in the investment community is in business-to-business." That's at the heart of the PlanSoft business plan. "We want to move the meeting industry onto the Web," says PlanSoft's Ed Tromczynski.

Leading the recent financing are Cornerstone Equity Investors, based in New York City, and Comcast Interactive Capital, in Philadelphia.

first look at new boston cc Boston will have a new 1.7 million-square-foot convention and exhibition center in late 2003. The $700 million project was designed by Rafael Vinoly in association with HNTB of Boston. In unveiling the design, Massachusetts Convention Center Authority Chairwoman Gloria Cordes Larson said, "There isn't a major organization in this country that doesn't want to hold its meeting in Boston." The design challenge in this case was to create a facility that works as a major convention center and exhibition hall while assimilating into its residential site on the South Boston waterfront. Starwood Hotels was chosen to build the facility's headquarters hotel, a Sheraton.