Private equity firm KKR & Co LLP is looking to cut an all-cash deal to acquire U.S. online health publisher WebMD Health Corp. The company has a market capitalization of $2.1 billion which made it quite an enticing investment for private equity and venture capitalist firms.
Founded in 1996, WebMD has grown into one of the most popular health websites for consumers and medical professionals, attracting more than 70 million monthly unique visitors in 2016, according to analytics company comScore Inc. It was founded by James H. Clark and Pavan Nigam as Healthscape.
Later it was rebranded as Healtheon and then again rebranded in 1999 to form Healtheon/WebMD. The name was later shortened to WebMD.
WebMD also owns medical news and education brand Medscape, which accounted for around 60% of its advertising revenue in 2016. Earlier this year, the company said it was looking at alternatives as it witnessed a drop in advertising revenues.
In 2014, KKR acquired a Content and Internet Technology products and service company Internet Brands for $1.1 billion, along with two other private equity firms, Hellman & Friedman LLC and JMI Equity.
If KKR moves forward with the acquisition of WebMD, we can freely anticipate a coalition of the 2 acquired companies. The deal would then bring all of WebMD’s websites – WebMD.com, Medscape.com and MedicineNet.com – along with Internet Brands’ sites – DentalPlans.com, VeinDirectory.org and AllAboutCounseling.com, under one rook. Together, the conglomerate could increase its revenue share, market share, and content quality.
Megha Shah for TechFunnel.com
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.