Ex-Orange chief heads Net launch

Chris Moss, the former launch marketing director of Orange, has emerged as the chief executive of Internet start-up nextweekend.com.

The Internet start-up is the first company to have the backing of incubator.com, the joint initiative between Oracle, Sun Microsystems, Cisco and Exodus.

The initiative, set up in September, allows Internet start-ups to develop and test e-commerce applications for three months before launching a full e-business.

incubator.com is aimed at entrepreneurs who have conducted the initial research for an e-business idea. It supplies hardware, software, network infrastructure and Web hosting facilities for a three-month period at a reduced price.

Nextweekend.com will go live early next year and offers consumers all aspects of a weekend break including hotel booking and car-hire.

Moss was vice-president of marketing for ICO Global Communications, but was among 40 contracted staff who were laid off after the company hit financial difficulties in August.

Before joining ICO Moss worked as a marketing consultant at Lloyds TSB. He was also marketing director of Virgin Atlantic.

Moss is one of a number of marketers including Ellis Watson – former marketing director of The Sun and News of the World, and Toby Constantine – former marketing director for The Times and Sunday Times – looking to cash in on the Internet boom.