Barry Diller Executive Suite - H 2014
Matt FurmanBarry Diller‘s IAC/InterActiveCorp said on Thursday that its board has approved a plan for an initial public offering of The Match Group, which is made up of its online dating businesses.
IAC also named Joey Levin, formerly CEO of its search and applications business, its new CEO. Greg Blatt will remain chairman and Sam Yagan CEO of The Match Group, which includes Match.com, Tinder and OKCupid.
“As many know from our actions over the last 20 years, I’m not a believer in simply agglomerating assets in perpetuity,” said IAC chairman Diller. “I’ve long felt that as entities grow into size and maturity it’s healthy to give them separation and independence from a mother church.”
He added: “Over the last two decades, IAC and its progeny have grown into seven separate public companies with a current shareholder value of over $44 billion – given that we started with a base of $275 million, it’s a more than satisfactory record.”
In 2008, the firm spun off four companies simultaneously.
“Since that time we’ve grown the company substantially, more than quadrupling the company’s value, with The Match Group leading the way — and so now, under the superb leadership of Greg Blatt and Sam Yagan, we want to take the step of offering the public the ability to own shares directly in this singular area of Internet activity,” Diller said.
He concluded: “As for IAC, we now have a group of assets with great potential and, with the appointment of Joey Levin as CEO, a leader who has the youth, energy and ability to develop them in hopefully the same growth track as has been demonstrated throughout our 20-year history. We start with nearly 20 individual businesses, a strong balance sheet and, I believe, the same level of ambition as we had at the beginning.”
IAC expects Match to issue less than 20 percent of its common stock in the IPO, with IAC’s remaining stake represented by both high- and low-vote common shares. The IPO is expected to be completed during the fourth quarter.
Twitter: @georgszalai
June 25, 6:30 a.m. Updated headline to highlight that IAC is pursuing an IPO of Match Group.
