InfoSpace Taps Switchboard For Business Search Push

"The yellow pages industry generates nearly $15 billion in annual advertising sales in the U.S. and is experiencing a migration from print-based consumer searches to online searches," the two firms said in a statement, citing market-research firm the Kelsey Group. "In 2003, the online directory market was approximately $450 million and is growing rapidly."

On Friday, InfoSpace said it would pay $160 million in cash for Switchboard. InfoSpace said the combined operation will represent about 23 percent of total online yellow-page searches. Switchboard's chief business activity is the generation of business through its www.switchboard.com site, but the firm also generates significant activity by licensing its products to Web portals, newspaper publishers' online business-advertising efforts, and yellow page print publishers.

The merged operation will also provide a better competitive vehicle to face new moves into local business-search markets by Google and Yahoo. The market continues to boom, with the Kelsey Group predicting online yellow-page searches to grow 25 percent annually.

The merger is scheduled to close early in July.

This story courtesy of TechWeb.