Update: We’re hearing the price was around $200 million.
This afternoon Comcast announced that it will acquire movie site Fandango. The price isn’t being disclosed, but we’re working on it.
Fandango generates revenue from the sale of movie tickets online, and via advertising on its site. February Comscore statistics puts Fandango at 3.8 million unique visitors generating 39 million page views (see the last chart in this post for a comparison with other movie sites). They sell tickets to 15,000 screens in 1,300 theaters.
The companies also announced that they will launch a new service this summer called Fancast which looks like it will be competing with online TV guides and IPTV startups like YouTube and Joost and others:
Fancast, which will launch this summer, will be a national entertainment site where people can search and discover television and movie content, while managing their viewing experience across multiple devices. With Fancast, consumers will be able to search for their favorite shows, movies, actors and actresses, or simply enjoy the video content on the site. Fancast will provide consumers with a place to discover when their favorite shows or movies are “on,” and where they can view them via television, video-on-demand, online or on other devices.
Fandango was founded in 2000 by seven large U.S. movie exhibitors. Investors include Accretive Technology Partners and Technology Crossover Ventures.
The bastion of two crappy commercial campaigns can now come together.
Not only is Fandago good to go but it’s now also comcastic. You can now enjoy paper bag dolls talking with turtles about saving dough, saving moolah, and saving cabbage all the while in reality Comcast is huge corporation whose sole mission is to suck you dry.
Hooray.
Tell me about it Alaska. There’s nothing better than when these limited bandwidth telcos try and buy their way into more unique distribution channels. I mean, seriously, why can’t they just invest 70 percent of their time on businesses that they are good at — like limiting the amount of bandwidth that a consumer can buy, and slowing the growth of fiber connectivity. They can spend the other 20 percent of their time trying to figure out how to deal with web 2.0 companies that always want to monetize off their content, and than they can spend the remaining 10 percent of their time on paying enormous premiums for businesses like fandango, and than ruin them, like all old-school corporations do when they acquire “unique companies.” 70/20/10. Doesn’t anyone understand how this model contributes to real innovation?
Comcast seems to screw every single thing they touch. Look what happened to TechTv, completely turned into a bad gaming channel.
Traditional dough on the move! Comcast is like the old Steve McQueen movie The Blob. Why coudn’t the mob just buy in?
well its a nice name but what does it mean?
I can remember the first time I used Fandango. I was like “Wow, I can buy movie tickets online! Awesome!” I can remember the first time I had to deal with Comcast’s customer service. I was like “Wow, this sucks!” Comcast, please don’t screw up Fandango.