General Motors to create Web cars

Car giant, General Motors (GM), is spinning off its Internet activities into a subsidiary called e-GM, which will help create one of the first so-called 'Web cars'.

The division will link 100 GM Web sites into a more coherent whole, and become responsible for the development a Web-connected car. Web cars will start testing in the autumn and will be on general sale within 18 months.

e-GM will be headed by Mark Hogan, previously head of the small car division. The company predicts that 500 million people will be using the Net by 2003 which will have a $200bn influence on car sales.

GM already includes the Onstar system, which uses GPS (Global Positioning System) technology to find the car and inform emergency services in case of accident.