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Penthouse acquires Adult FriendFinder for $500 million

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penthouse.jpgPenthouse Media Group Inc. has acquired social networking company Various, Inc. and its subsidiaries for $500 million in cash and securities. With $340 million in projected combined 2007 revenues, this acquisition makes Penthouse the largest adult entertainment company in the world.

Various has an extensive affiliate network, as well as a rapidly growing member base of more than 260 million consumers and a total paid subscriber list in excess of 1.2 million. Various operates more than 25 online communities including adultfriendfinder.com, which is a top 50 web site nationwide. Adultfriendfinder.com is one of the most highly trafficked web sites in the world with more than 18 million members.

The transaction is the latest step in Penthouse’s expansion march, having previously acquired Danni.com and the Jill Kelly Productions library.

Originally posted on December 12, 2007 @ 3:04 pm

Zipidee acquires TotalVid.com

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zipidee.pngZipidee has acquired the TotalVid.com from Landmark Communications, making it the Internet’s largest digital marketplace for mid- to long-tail instructional, educational, and special interest ‘pay for’ content.

As a result of the acquisition, Zipidee now has:

• More than 10,000 titles for sale, with the majority of these titles under exclusive licensing arrangement
• Over 600 content sellers, ranging from independent producers to major media companies
• Over 300,000 visitors per month
• More than 1 million seller listing page views per month
• Approximately 150,000 active registered members
• Two new digital marketplaces: TotalVid.com and VideoWaza.com

Zipidee now gives consumers on-demand access to the Internet’s largest selection of unique, hard-to-find videos. Consumers have access to thousands of titles in more than 100 categories, including action sports, martial arts, instructional, anime, travel, and more, many of which are not available at other online markets such as iTunes and Amazon Unbox. Financial details of the acquisition were undisclosed.

Originally posted on December 5, 2007 @ 5:05 pm

Walt Disney Internet Group acquires iParenting Media

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iparenting.pngThe Walt Disney Internet Group has acquired iParenting Media in a move that adds to its already strong line-up of family-targeted web properties within Disney Online, including Disney Family.com, FamilyFun.com and Wondertime.com. With the acquisition, Disney Online gains iParenting’s vast resources, quality content and vibrant community that serves families, young parents and parents-to-be in English and Spanish. iParenting’s content and services will be integrated into Disney’s network of family targeted sites. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

iParenting’s portfolio features a wide array of professional and user-generated content, including thousands of articles and expert Q&A’s and hundreds of active mom message boards. Additionally, the network includes the highly-regarded iParenting Media Awards, the only certified product review and awards program in the industry.

Originally posted on December 4, 2007 @ 3:12 pm

Glu Mobile agrees to acquire China’s leading mobile games publisher

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viewmedia.jpgGlu Mobile has agreed to acquire Beijing Zhangzhong MIG Information Technology Co. Ltd., a leading developer and publisher of mobile games for China. The acquisition accelerates the company’s presence in China and deepens Glu’s relationship with China Mobile, the largest wireless carrier in China.

According to China’s Ministry of Information Industry, the Chinese mobile market has more than 500 million mobile subscriptions. With the acquisition of MIG, Glu will be positioned to more effectively publish its existing world-class branded and award-winning original titles in China and to continue to publish MIG’s market leading portfolio of culturally relevant and popular local titles. Importantly, this acquisition makes Glu the first top-tier global mobile games publisher to acquire a developer and publisher of mobile games in China.

As part of the acquisition, Wang Bin, chief executive officer, MIG, will join Glu as General Manager focused on China and Glu will add MIG’s approximately 80 employees to its worldwide team. These employees will continue to develop and publish mobile games that are relevant to a local, and potentially global, audience as well as work in conjunction with Glu’s existing Beijing office to further penetrate the Chinese market.

Under the terms of the transaction, which the parties anticipate will close in approximately three weeks, MIG’s shareholders will receive approximately $14.7 million in cash. Additional payments of up to $25 million in cash and stock are contingent upon the achievement by MIG of certain financial milestones during 2008, with a portion of the additional payments subject to continued employment of the principal officers of MIG.

Originally posted on December 3, 2007 @ 11:49 am

Fox Entertainment Group acquires Beliefnet

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beliefnet.pngFox Entertainment Group (FEG) announced its acquisition of Beliefnet, a website that enables consumers to better understand their faith and build diverse spiritual communities by providing content and tools for a broad range of religions and spiritual approaches. Beliefnet, the largest online faith and spirituality destination, will become part of Fox Digital Media, spearheaded by President Dan Fawcett, which takes on an expanded role to support FEG’s vast cable, TV and film brands online, and drive FEG’s continued growth in the online market.

The acquisition provides Beliefnet with vast resources to further build and enhance its already popular brand. It also offers an online platform for FEG to distribute content from its extensive media library and for News Corp. to expand its faith-based businesses, including HarperCollins’ Zondervan and HarperOne brands, and 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment’s faith-based programming initiative.

Beliefnet provides devotional tools, access to the best spiritual teachers in the world, thought-provoking commentary and a portfolio of web-based social networking tools to enable a supportive community surrounding each person’s unique spiritual principles and beliefs.

Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Originally posted on December 4, 2007 @ 12:33 pm