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Espotting Merges With US Firm In £97 Million Deal

European pay-per-click search network, Espotting, has been acquired by US marketing group FindWhat.com for £97 million.
The agreement will see Espotting’s stockholders will receive approximately 8.1 million shares of FindWhat.com common stock and around £16 million in cash. It is understood that Espotting’s co-founders, Daniel and David Ishag, will receive a windfall in excess of £20 million.
Daniel Ishag, founder and CEO of Espotting, commented: “In one transaction both companies achieve a steep change in scale, which should allow us to capitalise fully on the rapid expansion in performance based online marketing.”
He added: “This combination will allow the two companies to bring together the best of their respective talents. We believe this will help enhance the expert local knowledge they bring to their respective markets, rewarding advertisers with increased ability to achieve greater reach through one company.”
The agreement will see three Espotting board members sit on the FindWhat.com board and Daniel Ishag will become vice chairman of the merged group. Espotting co-founder, Sebastian Bishop, will become chief commercial officer and chief operating officer of the new entity and Johnatan Bunis will become president of European operations.
Espotting provides cost-per-click marketing solutions to over 16,000 clients and is one of the few internet start-ups to have prospered. The company launched its service in the UK in September 2000 and over the last 18 months has expanded its reach to France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Ireland and Switzerland (see ESpotting Expands Into Europe).
Over the past two years Espotting has faced increasing competition in the cost-per-click ad market, most notably from Overture and Google, which recently launched its own cost-per-click advertising service called AdWords (see Google Enters Cost-Per-Click Market).
Espotting: 0207539 0500 www.espotting.com
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