About.com For Sale, Google Potential Buyer
Posted on February 9, 2005
Primedia, a magazine publishing company, has put About.com up for sale. Several big online players are interested including Google, The New York Times Company, AOL and Ask Jeeves. Ask Jeeves acquired Bloglines.com, the online blog reading and sharing service, so it would be interesting if they followed up by grabbing About.com as well. If Google buys them it could define them as more of a content company.
About.com is a network of hundreds of topic specific websites run by expert guides. It was originally called The Mining Co. Primedia bought About.com in October, 2000 for $690 million. Primedia is expected to get only $350 to $500 million for About.com.
The New York Times reports that Goldman Sachs is managing the bidding process for About.com. We should find out soon which company wins the About.com auction.
