INFOSPACE.COM (INSP): The initial public offering of aggregator/integrator of content services is one of four Internet deals expected to price this week. The company was originally scheduled to debut in late-October but was delayed in order to give the Internet momentum crowd time to recover from the late-summer thrashing. Infospace is known for its its yellow pages and white pages
directory information. The company derives substantially all of its revenues from national advertising, promotions and local Internet yellow pages advertising. Given unusually high bad debt expenses of 9.7% of revenues for the quarters ended September 30, 1998, it appears that Infospace sells a significant amount of its ad inventory to small, under-capitalized companies. For the 9-months ended Sept 30, 800-U.S. Search Inc. accounted for approximately 20.1% of revenues and 38.1% of accounts receivable. A considerable portion of the company's substantial year/year revenue growth can be linked to deals signed with Netscape and AOL, under which InfoSpace has paid, and will in
the future pay, certain carriage fees. The 4 million share Hambrecht & Quist led offering is expected to price between $9-$11. However, given the stock's modest Price/Sales ratio relative to other recent
Internet deals, Hambrecht & Quist will probably be able to get away with raising the range.
Common Stock Outstanding: 19.12 mln shares
Market Capitalization: $172-$210 mln
Revenues*: 1997= $0.93 mln; 1998= $5.37 mln
Net Loss*: 1997= $(0.03); 1998= $(0.28)
Price/Sales Ratio (TTM): 28-34
Competition: AnyWho? (AT&T), Sidewalk (Microsoft), Yahoo! Yellow Pages and White
Pages,
*First 9-Months of the Year |
