Irish online classifieds site DoneDeal has completed an investment deal with the Schibsted Media Group, which sees Schibsted take just a 50.09pc stake of DoneDeal.
As part of the deal, Fred Karlsson, co-founder of DoneDeal, will continue to manage the company and will still be a major shareholder of the business. Financial details of the deal have not been disclosed.
DoneDeal had revenues of more than €3m in the fiscal year ending 30 April 2011, with the business growing 124pc year-on-year. It employs 10 staff members at its office in Wexford.
It was founded in 2005 by both Fred and Geraldine Karlsson and today it has more than 2m unique visitors to the website each month. Some 85,000 new items are advertised each month across its 119 classified sections.
“The investment by Schibsted is a significant vote of confidence in the achievements of all the team at DoneDeal and the prospects for the company over the coming years,” said Fred Karlsson.
“Our new partnership with Schibsted will be very much based on providing collaborative synergies to work and learn from each other in providing an even better service and experience for our customers and will provide DoneDeal with a significant business partner that can support us in taking our business to the next level of growth that we now aspire to.”
The Norway-based Schibsted Media Group operates as a Classified Media division, supporting online classified sites across 25 countries.
“We are very happy to include DoneDeal into our family of online classified sites in Schibsted,” said Terje Seljeseth, CEO of Schibsted Classified Media.
“A strong No 1 position in the local Irish market together with a financially sound and profitable business operation means that DoneDeal is ideally positioned to grow further in the years to come and to take advantage of society’s move to greater use of online classifieds sites to buy and sell things.”
