UNDER
THE SECURITIES ACT OF 1933 -.USA
ANCESTRY.COM INC."
Ancestry.com is to go public and raise $75million on US Stock Market
Ancestry.com Inc. has filed a
registration statement with the US Securities and
Exchange Commission in preparation for going public on the USA Stock Market
This statement is preliminary to issuing an
initial public offering with the objective of
raising $75 million. The company, founded in 1983
and based in Provo, Utah, plans to list on Nasdaq
or NYSE under the symbol ACOM. The present
Ancestry.com has many owners, but the majority
stake of some 67% is held by Spectrum Equity
Investors, a media/communications firm, which
paid about $300 million in 2007 for its share of
the company. The other investors include Sorenson
Media, CMGI@Ventures and EsNet Group.
Together with appendices the registration
document is more than 150 pages of financial
tables and legalese. Anyone who feels they can
digest the document will find it online at the
SEC website
A number of genealogy blogs have kindly gleaned
and digested some of the more interesting
snippets to be found in the document and I am
grateful to member John D Reid of Anglo Celtic
Connections, Dick Eastman and Kimberley Powell at
About Genealogy.com for the following information:
Ancestry.com is the world’s largest online
resource for family history, with almost one
million paying subscribers around the world as of
June 30, 2009. Revenues have increased from
$122.6 million in 2004 to $197.6 million in 2008,
a compound annual growth rate of 12.7%. For six
month of 2009, it had revenues of $99.9 million
with profits of $8.18 million, compared to $87.4
million revenues in first six month of 2008 and
profits of $1.24 million. The total cost of
revenues was $43,614,000. The total operating
expenses were $138,257,000, the largest single
component of which was $52,341,000 for
advertising and marketing. The company has
invested about $80 million to date in making the
genealogy content available to subscribers, to
acquire or license, digitize, index and publish additional records.
:
Approximately 45% of subscribers have been with
the company continuously for more than two years
as of June 30, 2009. In the six months ended June
2009, visitors to the company websites spent an
average of 19.1 minutes on their websites per
usage day. The company sees even more potential
or growth with introduction of the TV show "Who
Do You Think You Are?" in U.S. in early 2010,
following a similar show on BBC in 2006.
In 2008
Formax, based in Zhongguancun Science Park,
Beijing, China, performed a majority of the
company's data transcription as measured by cost.
The company considers its competition to be:
• FamilySearch, and its website FamilySearch.org (
• Commercial entities, including online
genealogical research services, library content
distributors, search engines and portals,
retailers of books and software related to
genealogical research and family tree creation
and family history oriented social networking websites.
• Other non-profit entities and organizations,
genealogical societies, governments and agencies
that may make vital statistics or other records
available to the public for free.
As of June 30, 2009, the company had
approximately 570 full-time employees and
approximately 100 part-time and contingent
employees. All but one of the 13 directors and
executive officers are male. Their ages range
from 33 to 61. Nine are in their 40s.
For 2008 Timothy Sullivan, President and Chief
Executive Officer, received total compensation of
$ 2,242,482 on a base salary of $ 350,000. total
compensation for the other company executives
was: Joshua Hanna $1,219,890; Andrew Wait
$778,871; David Rinn $620,925; Michael Wolfgramm $473,175.
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