Match Group Inc. will go public

By Money Times

Oct 18, 2015 11:06 PM EDT

Match Group Inc. is planning to capitalize the current booming market for online dating and is seeking to go public. The company had sought legal advice and documents on Friday for an IPO and is expected to be listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market.

The company currently owns around 45 sites with several online dating website including the successful Tinder, OKCupid, Match.com and also a non-dating website, The Princeton Review. According to The Wall Street Journal, the company recorded a total revenue of $888.3 million in revenue at the end of 2014 with a total profit of $148.4 million.

With the Tinder apps popularity and its latest monetization strategy where users have to pay for extra right swipes, the company revenue is expected to increase too by the end of 2015. The company spokesperson told Bloomberg that they are also planning to pull in more revenue from the advertisement too in the future and not relying on subscription alone.

With its more than 59 million active users and 4.9 million paid users, Match will surely be able to give investors with profit quickly. Based on the initial filing, the company is expected to raise $100 million and some of the portion from the amount raised will be used to pay the debt to IAC.

Besides revenue, another concern that is raised by Match is the potential of a cyber attack. The company said that they had invested and takes all the required actions to prevent any cyber attack as that event will not only damage the company's reputation in the stock exchange, but it will also hurt its credibility among its subscribers.

Match Group is part IAC/InterActiveCorp which is run by the media mogul, Barry Diller as reported by CNN Money. According to the S-1 filing, the parent company will still own more than 50 percent of stake in Match under Class B shares. Other investors that will lead the offers include JPMorgan Chase & Co., Allen & Co. and Bank of America.

Based on the report, current CEO and Chairman, Greg Blatt will still hold the position while the cofounder, Sam Yagan position is still unclear but he will still run as a leader in the company.

Other companies under IAC that has gone public includes Expedia, TripAdvisor and Live Nation and this latest IPO offered by the company is expected to perform well too. Match is hoping that the listing will be able to proceed without any problem like its rival, Zoosk Inc which unable to go public after it had encountered several problems in the process.

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