TechCrunch is reporting that Internet Brands is being sold for $640 Million dollars.
Internet Brands is publicly traded and the price comes to $13.35 a share a premium of 46% off of Friday’s closing price.
The company owns some great generic domains like those listed above but owns over plenty of domains which have “trademarked” terms in the domain, but they have all been built into sites.
According to TechCrunch.com the sites generate 62 million visitors a month and made $4.6 Million in the 2nd quarter of 2010 on revenue of $28 million.
Here is a complete list of the domains which Internet Brands owns:
CarsDirect.com
Autos.com
NewCarTestDrive.com
SellMyCar.com
AcuraForums.com
AcuraLegend.com
AcuraZine.com
AudiForums.com
AudiWorld.com
ChryslerForum.com
DodgeChallenger.com
DodgeForum.com
ModernHemi.com
MoparForums.com
F150Online.com
FordForum.com
FordMustangs.com
Ford-Trucks.com
MercuryForum.com
ModMotorTech.com
MustangBoards.com
MustangForums.com
PassionFord.com
HDForums.com
CBRForum.com
CivicForums.com
FitFreak.net
HondaAccordForum.com
Honda-Acura.net
HondaCivicForum.com
HondaForum.com
HondaMarketPlace.com
Honda-Tech.com
S2000.com
SuperhawkForum.com
Hyundaiforum.com
BlazerForum.com
Buickforum.com
Cadillacforum.com
CamaroForums.com
ChevroletForum.com
CobaltSS.net
CorvetteForum.com
CorvetteForums.com
HummerForums.com
LS1Tech.com
MonteCarloForum.com
PontiacTalk.com
Saabforums.com
Saturnforum.com
ThirdGen.org
G35Driver.com
MyG37.com
IsuzuForums.com
JaguarForums.com
KawasakiForums.com
LandRoverForums.com
ClubLexus.com
LexusForum.com
Mazda3Club.com
MazdaForum.com
RX7Club.com
RX8Club.com
MBWorld.org
MercedesForum.com
MercedesMcLaren.com
MiniCooperForums.com
NorthAmericanMotoring.com
EvolutionM.net
MitsubishiForum.com
GTRforums.com
Maxima.org
My350z.com
NissanForum.com
NissanMaximas.com
S-chassis.com
ZDriver.com
ClassicOldsmobile.com
OldsmobileForum.com
6speedOnline.com
GermanAutoForums.com
RennList.com
Scionlife.com
i-Club.com
Scoobynet.com
SuzukiForum.com
4RunnerForum.com
CamryForums.com
YotaTech.com
VolvoForums.com
VolkswagenForum.com
ATVConnection.com
BikerForums.org
GreenHybrid.com
Performancetrucks.net
Stuntlife.com
TruckForums.com
Wikicars.org
AirlinePilotCentral.com
aviationemployment.com
pprune.org
ClassADrivers.com
RealPolice.net
GrooveJob.com
fleethelper.com
3FatChicks.com
CancerForums.net
DentalFind.com
FitDay.com
HealthNews.org
OnlineSurgery.com
InfertilitySpecialist.com
I-Am-Pregnant.com
SkinCareGuide.com
Vasectomy.com
VeinDirectory.org
DermaNetwork.org
ScanDirectory.com
ApartmentRatings.com
Craftster.org
DavesGarden.com
DoItYourself.com
ePodunk.com
Gardens.com
RealEstateABC.com
Splitcoaststampers.com
ThatRentalSite.com
tenantmarket.com
businessmart.com
businessfinance.com
creditorweb.com
brokeroutpost.com
ExpertHub.com
finweb.com
Loan.com
mortgage101.com
smallbusinessnotes.com
AVRev.com
bargainist.com
Tjoos.com
BensBargains.net
DoDTracker.com
PursePage.com
Boddit.com
DealLocker.com
HighDefDigest.com
HighDefForum.com
Outblush.com
Steves-Digicams.com
UltimateCoupons.com
bbonline.com
cruisemates.com
cruisereviews.com
slowtrav.com
vacationtimesharerentals.com
vacationhomes.com
vamoose.com
bikeforums.net
dvdtalk.com
equinehits.com
familycorner.com
flyertalk.com
horsetopia.com
kidscamps.com
thehulltruth.com
huntingnet.com
mysummercamps.com
offshoreonly.com
puppydogweb.com
trekearth.com
wikitravel.org
world66.com
vetinfo.com
britishexpats.com
Before anyone gets carried away remember Mike said a lot of these have been developed in sites. DoItYourself.com for example gets over 2,000,000 visitors a month.
This is not a domain asset sale but a company with developed products which just happen to be on a domain. Without any content these domains stand alone would be worth a fraction of $650 million.
No difference than a goto.com sale or ask.com sale but of course, the people will be out saying I cant believe they sold all those domains for $650 million. They never – they sold developed properties on domains.
Let the humor begin.
Congrats to Internet Brands .. great sale.
Alan
Absolutely right, this is not a domain sale but a sale of a company that has built a nice profit stream using a few great generics and a lot of fair domains into sites.
$20 Million a year in profits is no joke.
My favorite domain off the list is:
3fatgirls.com
LOL … 2fatgirls.com and 4fatgirls.com are available .. 3 is a lucky number 🙂
Yes, these are developed sites, attracting (in total) a lot of uniques per month. At this price, Internet Brands seem to have leveraged their assets well.
Interesting that Internet Brands only have a small number of short, pure, top class generic domains (Autos.com, Gardens.com, Loan.com, Vasectomy.com + say, DoItYourself.com, and one or two other good ones)…
…Great tho these generics are, mostly their portfolio is 2/3 word descriptives/brandables – or TM Forum-type domains/sites.
I’d have expected a higher quality raw portfolio with the resources Internet Brands had at their disposal…
Fantastic acquisition and great PR for our industry!
Some killer domains in that network and well developed.
Alan
3 is the perfect number
4 is way too many
LMAO! As long as they all leave in the morning any number works for me.
WOW, very nice indeed, Can you imagine how much the top domainers portfolios could be worth if they were developed in a similar way. EEEEK
What do you reckon Autos.com, Loan.com and Doityourself.com would be worth
(just the domains without development?)
w0w.
This has me scratching my head.
I thought blatantly profiting from well known TMs was
cybersquatting and an IP lawyer’s bread and butter.
Maxima, Nissan, Corvette, Audi, Dodge and others.
How did they get away with it this long?
Not many premium names there. I could only find autos.com, gardens and possibly carsdirect.com.
Chris
Just checked the spam folder of Word Press your comments were trapped in there, now approved
Mike
Loan.com is a great generic as well as DoItYourself.com and Vasectomy.com
Many of those domain names include trademarked terms… Acura, Mustang, Corvette, Chevrolet, etc…
Any reason to think that those companies can’t get those domain names back if they wanted to?
“My favorite domain off the list is:
3fatgirls.com”
3fatgirls.com is unregistered.
It’s actually 3fatchicks.com.
I like my version better
Yes, there are 3 more premium as you mentioned. Loan.com, Doityourself.com and vasectomy.com . Others were not that great domains.
That showed the power of development of the domains.
I looked at Autos.com and I don’t know which CMS they are using for the articles. Any one knows it? I am pretty sure it isn’t WP.
“Others were not that great domains. That showed the power of development of the domains.”
True, I’d prefer the domains owned by verticlescope.com or wnnmedia.com…mmmm 🙂 tasty tasty!
There sure are a lot of TM terms in the mix.
Brad
Your missing another big component of their traffic, they acquired expert hub earlier this year with lots of legal related domains, not sure how much this makes up of their traffic
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Internet-Brands-Acquires-iw-2654547464.html?x=0&.v=1
Its a great buy and gave a nice bump to the Quinstreet Share price, up nicely from the $12 range you were indicating Mike
What I think it does is helps bring more attention to the generic + traffic model and sheds light on companies that are simply churning out the bogus content biz model that are yet to be profitable to date…this along with the Bankrate buy a few years ago show that VC funds are paying close attention to this space.
Don
Demand Media for better or worse is going to be the catalyst for this model on the street
Lets hope the IPO goes very well despite some issues demand has, including lack of profit
Publicly traded company that deals in VERY blatant trademarks ? What a joke.
I’d say they are bad news for the industry….. and they make domainers like me look bad.
Deke
They don’t deal in trademarks they use domains they have every right to use to develop out sites.
How many camera shops in the world do you pass that have a “cannon” sign hanging out?
Nothing wrong with it.
I have to agree with Mike. A lot of trademark law is very misunderstood by many domainers.
On one hand some people think registering a variation of Coca Cola and putting ads on it is ok while others think it’s a blatant use of trademark infringement (which it is).
The missing component of trademark law really comes down to use and parking pages do not qualify as anything other than bad use. Some of the most popular sites in the world have a trademark in the domain like peopleofwalmart.com, bmwblog.com, etc and when you use a TM in a domain as an intent not to solely capitalize on the brand but almost as a fan site (good or bad) it can be often seen as legal use. Of course, the interpretation of this is best discussed by a real lawyer (not me) but it’s not a very complex law boiling down to the way the domain is used. Since parking pages do not qualify as use for the most part its no wonder why TM laws are misunderstood since most domainers do not develop but would rather argue how their site (I mean parking page) is use. Its not.
Even a better example are celebrity names. It’s perfectly ok to create a fan site on britneyspears.com as long its good use. In the high profile Madonna.com case back in 2000 Madonna won the rights since the owner was directing traffic to a porn site and clearly had no vested interest in the name other than trying to capitalize on the name. Now, if the owners name was Madonna or the owner created a legitimate fan site this probably would have turned out different.
Nissan.com is the most famous TM case that continues to be ongoing. Most domainers would say hey that clearly is a TM infringement owning that name but the owner’s last name is Nissan and has a computer company called Nissan Computer. It’s probably the most interesting read out there when it comes to long term domain disputes – in fact, the entire case is available on nissan.com
Anyone registering a domain purely to park should always use common sense and when in doubt consult an attorney.
Trademark law is pretty confusing for attorneys much less ordinary folk but Alan is quite correct.
If you haven’t check out this case you should it lays out the law pretty well and gives you an idea of how trademark terms can be used by other than the trademark holders
http://www.thedomains.com/2010/07/11/federal-court-rules-against-toyota-in-domain-case-buy-a-lexus-com-buyorleaselexus-com/
Don’t forget that this company was originally CarsDirect.com and it also held the record for the most VC funds received the during the 1998-2000 run-up. This funding equaled $400 Million. I’m pretty sure some of the investors money was returned for pennies on the dollar but I’m not sure how much.
I have to add my 1.5cents here on tm law:
IIRC, you can have a website that says UsedDellParts.com if that’s what you’re selling. Now if you sell HP parts there or do something fishy is totally different. Companies don’t like it because they want to control everything but apparently you have a right to describe what you’re selling.
I believe that was decided on used Lexus cars and a couple won against Toyota without a lawyer. The reasoning was that new and used cars are part of the marketplace and Toyota can’t have a monopoly on everything through the chain (imagine not being able to place an ad to sell your used Camry because Camry is a tm)
In short, F UDRP, we need more US court reasoning.
The couple in the Lexus case were car brokers and they were selling cars other than Lexus as well, court said that was Ok too
” 3fatgirls.com is unregistered.
It’s actually 3fatchicks.com.”
—
“I like my version better”
—
Wasn’t it Shakespeare who said:
“A fat girl by any other name is still a fat girl!”
…or something like that.
🙂
Amazing comeback, in 1999 just carsdirect . com lost over 70 Million USD
This figure caught my eye:
(Rounding things up)
They paid : 640 Million USD for 640 Million Yearly Visitors. (* one buck per “pair of eye balls”)
The bottom line is : this is educated money , surely the “Number crushers” looked at it, analyzed it, the purchase was made at a perfect time when the company it’s in the black even under this recessionary enviroment, it proves “domains/development (of the right kind)” can be done in a profitable way, it’s is viable…
I looked at the names and aside the marks it looks like a very balanced portfolio eg: doityourself.com a beautiful name/portal to own at this current stage in the economic cycle.
(I think I own the spanish version..I need to check on that)
Lastly…
How much is F Schilling portfolio worth with hardly any overhead ?
Cheers.
Domo
assuming everybody had 2 eyes.
I wouldn’t even pay reg fees for most of those 🙂
the moral of the story is crap sites /domains with viewers are still worth big $
I’m really confused. This pile of domains looks like it’s a CADNA.org hunt farm. I remember when I purchased these identical types of domains in 1999, about 150 of them, including “usedporsche.com” and “fordrepairs.com” and was hit by an avalanche of C&D’s. Back then, it was serious. I deleted the domains, and three months later, a federal case ruling came out that stated EACH domain owner had to be sued separately for TM infringement. The car companies had included hundreds of domain buyers listed in one juggernaut of a lawsuit for TMI. Their lawsuits were dismissed. arrgggh
NOTE: Am I the first to note that CADNA.org seems to “infringe” on the automotive site “CADNA.COM”? That’s okay tho, right?
oh well… On to Future Trend domains!
“oh well… On to Future Trend domains!”
Make your reservations for .VEGAS early.
The big (secret) Domainer events ramp up around New Years in .VEGAS and then merge into the annual CES – Consumer Electronics Show(s) including .X .XX .XXX AV the back-bone of the .NET
I’m glad to see Stephen basically agreed with my observation.
If I owned any of those domains, TM owners would have me in
federal court within months.
We realize the TM owners can pick and choice who they attack.
Maybe, the TM owners gave IB guide lines to maintain a good
working relationship.
I’m sure the TM owners want to have a good working relationship
with the owner of Autos,com and other automotive websites.
“Wasn’t it Shakespeare who said:
“A fat girl by any other name is still a fat girl!”
…or something like that.”
Sorry my original quote is inaccurate:
The correct quote is:
“A fat girl by any other name still weighs as much”.
@TheBigLieSociety
Love your handle, but I don’t respect any handle if it’s not known well enough to identify you (such as “Acro” and others).
When I talk about “Future Trend Domains”, it has nothing to do with new domain extensions like .Vegas. You’ll find out by the end of the year the exploding interest in prodserv domains that represent what’s coming for consumer/business trends.
There are some noobie domain investors (I can’t even call them ‘domainers’) who’ve already picked up some domains that could be worth six figures in less than 2 years. These investors don’t even understand the process of domain evaluation, yet were savvy enough to research new technology and pick out some ass-kicking domains. I’ve had to convince several of them NOT to sell them right now. They’ll love me for it later, and hopefully send me a little bonus when they sell when the domains mature. 😉
Tons of TM names there no doubt about it, if a craft lawyer is reading this and looking for a pay-day you might have found it. They definitely profitted from those TM holders in this sale there is no doubt about it, that is not using it as a fan site lmfao
It’s amazing to think about how valuable web domains have become. They’re selling like real estate was 10 years ago.