Inherited wealth: Ancestry.com to be sold for $1.6 billion
There's gold in your genes....
By Antony Savvas | Computerworld UK | Published 12:24, 22 October 12
Family tree website and media operation Ancestry.com is set to be acquired in a $1.6 billion deal.
US-based Ancestry.com, which is behind the BBC TV show "Who do you think you are?", is set to be sold at $32 a share, about 40 percent above its stock price in June, when reports of the company being up for sale first emerged.
Ancestry.com has over 2 million subscribers, with the main concentration being in the US, but with sizeable customer bases in the UK, Canada and Australia.
Private equity firm Permira is reported to be the buyer of the company, with existing shareholder Spectrum Equity also on board along with senior Ancestry.com directors.
Ancestry.com went public in an IPO in November 2009. The company is set to release its third-quarter results this Wednesday.
In August the company's international websites were hit by a major outage which lasted for several hours and which the firm put down to "site maintenance".
