Meetic, the popular European online dating company, announced today that it has agreed to buy the European operations of the IAC-owned Match.com. The news was announced on the blog of Loïc Le Meur, who is a board member of Meetic but will need to resign to leave room for an IAC representative.
IAC will sell 100% of the stock of Match Europe – the entity that houses Match.com’s European operations – for an approximate 27% stake in Meetic, plus a 5 million euro note (which converts to just over $6.33 million). Additional terms of the transaction are not being disclosed.
As Loïc points out, this is somewhat of a boost for the European internet industry, and the transaction is definitely turning Meetic into the default pan-European leader when it comes to online dating; one that will not easily be competed against. I wouldn’t exactly refer to it as ‘making history’ like Loïc does, yet I can’t help but notice Meetic’s tagline in their logo (”Same Game, New Rules”) and wonder if one could possibly find a phrase more appropriate to describe the deal.
From the press release:
Match.com is licensing the Match.com brand for its European operations to Meetic, and Meetic will optimize the two brands on a market-by-market basis. Match.com’s European operations include Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
Match Europe contributes approximately 13% of Match’s consolidated Operating Income Before Amortization. IAC expects annual run rate synergies to be at least 15 million Euros, though it will take a significant transition period before Meetic is able to fully realize them.
According to French newspaper Le Monde, Meetic had revenues of 153,7 million euros (close to $195 million) in 2008 and currently counts over 696,400 registered users. The company is public and listed on NYSE Euronext, currently valued at nearly 228 million euro ($289 million).
Acquisitions Meetic has made in the past to grow in Europe include eFriendsNet, Lexa, ParPerfeito, DatingDirect, Cleargay and Neu.
Meanwhile, IAC says Match.com will continue to operate all U.S.-based and remaining international operations, spanning 24 countries, 8 languages and five continents. This means that Match.com will no longer be competing against Meetic in Europe, but they’ll still be battling for ground in Latin America, the only continent where the companies both have a presence as of now. The IAC subsidiary also got a change at the helm: Greg Blatt, currently IAC’s Executive Vice President and General Counsel, has been named the new CEO of Match.com.
(Coverage in French on TechCrunch France)
I just got off the phone with Match, this is huge. They also announced a new CEO today. My blog, OnlineDatingPost, has been covering the online dating industry since 2002 and I’ll be publishing interviews and industry commentary in coming days as we sort through the news of the deals.
Great to see someone not plug themselves or their site… oops nevermind
Thanks Waldo, if you just want to rely on TC for your information thats fine.
Looks like Match can’t compete with Meetic in Europe!
Hey Robin! How is it going?
If you can beat them, join them.
Somebody has forgot to explicitly mention Meetic is F.R.E.N.C.H.
Actually, the 153,7 million euros figure reported by Le Monde is Meetic’s sales, not revenue. (unless sales and revenue mean the same thing. Excuse-me if I’m wrong, English is not my mother tongue)
Maybe this post should be updated.
$195M for 700K users, this is $279/user. Wow, this is a profitable Internet business. I am sure FriendFeed, Twitter, and even Facebook wished they had such a return.
the number is wrong.. the real numbr is upwards of 40 million. Meetic white label their product in Europe. For example France Telecom Orange portal has a dating site. The backend is meetic but the branding is Orange.
IMHO, websites like these would be much better if they offer users the ability to specify their own custom fields and make those fields not only structurally browsable but searchable as well.
Say a user wants to find a Capricorn male who graduated from Xyz University, is currrently a CTO at Xyz Holdings, Inc, has two daughters, speaks English and Italian, and whose favorite actor is Tom Hanks.
Existing sites that rely on finite set of fields make it impossible for users to specify their own field of interest. What if a user wants to specify their ‘Favorite [ fill in the blank ]? There is an infinite possibility on what that blank is.
Here’s a link to an example of how we solve that problem:
http://tinyurl.com/aw6vm7
K.I.S.S.
I believe match can not compete with meetic in europe area.
Greg, I think you are right. Meetic has a substantially lower ARU than suggested. It spends a LOT on advertising – can be seen by the low Page Views on alexa.
Still, on the paid side of things, Meetic is tearing up Europe, very little real competition in France and UK, not sure about Germany and Spain.
Is Plenty of Fish still doing good business??
It was actually MATCH.COM who beated Meetic on European market. In 2007 Mark from Meetic announced “war” and said whi ever wins over UK will win. Match.com did it and now they are being bought (so it’s other way round, If you can’t beat them, buy them)
….in 2008 and currently counts over 696,400 registered users.
That number is wrong by a massive magnitude. Please check your numbers.
Actually, Meetic made EUR 133.7m in revenues in 2008 (s. http://www.bour...97d49536e8c86ea), which at current rate is about USD 168.5m.
I’ve read Meetic’s whole 2006 financial report a week ago, and I can tell you that back in 2006 they had EUR 80m in sales, and EUR 17,4m in earnings before interest, taxes, and depreciations.
They also had 420 00 registered users, 15% monthly churn rate, and they were spending an average 35 euros in order to acquire a new user.
So the 2008 figures are pretty consistent with 2006, given the expected growth rate
“and currently counts over 696,400 registered users.”
Didn’t this number seem a little bit wrong when you where typing it?
I don’t have any insight in their number of registered users, but I consider Le Monde to be a credible source.
Well that’s cleared up the European online dating scene – think we’ll be filling the gap that will be left by this development
Strangely I always saw it happening the other way, that Match would take over DatingDirect in the UK and leave Meetic to have the other European countries.
I have huge respect for the Match UK team who have driven the business so well – at the same time we’ve seen DatingDirect melt away after losing a lot of momentum.
It would be crazy if the guys from DatingDirect took over the running of Match in the UK.
Seems to be very strange logic.
The Ecomomic climate doesnt seem to have stopped aquisitions from happening, check this out:
BlogCatalog.com, the social network for bloggers, has just swallowed up HalfHourMeals.com a social network that allows members to submit recipes, and rate recipes. see the article here http://www.whic...hour_meals.html
Ahhhh…..dating & sex sell, even in a down economy.
Seriously, it’s good to see businesses (and M&A activity) chugging along.
I wonder if facebook or other social networks will effect the dating sites in EU as they have in the United States.
I believe Match was already losing market share in Europe. They lost the touch with consumers in some of the European countries, possibly due to cultural and language differences.
Does anybody have the correct number for the number of users? It is interesting to see what costs and profit per member are.