ReveNews
Rumour Mill: IAC in Talks to Acquire Nextag
Back in June when I predicted that Experian would buy PriceGrabber, I also pondered whether IAC would buy Nextag. I’m not making this stuff up but… rumor has it that IAC (or maybe its subsidiary LendingTree) is in talks to buy Nextag.
I was right but it may have been for the wrong reason. I still think that IAC can use a shopping comparison engine. As we’ve seen from Pronto, it needs help and Nextag can offer the search engine that Pronto needs along with the merchant relationships that will take at least a year to develop.
The real kicker for IAC looks to be mortgages. While Nextag started as a shopping comparison engine, it got religion on mortgages just like LowerMyBills which changed its tune from helping consumers find cheaper utilities (still a great concept in my book but not as lucrative as mortgages).
LendingTree’s model differs from mortgage lead aggregators (e.g. Nextag and LowerMyBills). LendingTree is about applications, not leads. Acquiring Nextag would give Lending Tree another way to get marketshare, another source for leads and diversification in the mortgage business. It makes sense.
The Rumour Mill also has it that Quinstreet wanted to buy Nextag. Quinstreet + Nextag = Experian Interactive (Education leads from ClassesUSA, Shopping Comparison through PriceGrabber and Mortgage Leads through LowerMyBills). Interesting. Are we going to see a bidding war? AQuinstreet victory might lead to a nice S-1 to attract a buyer.
Will one of the other two credit bureaus wake up to this one?
It’s about time, considering all the security breaches into the major Credit Bureaus and privacy info databases, that the Feds bann any mergers of marketing operations and financial info trusteeships. Fat chance that Lowermybills, or Lending Tree and their competitors, won’t use their greed driven Adwhore mindsets to direct market into that insider information database.
David,
Is Quinstreet still kicking? Education market aside that is?
Quinstreet is still kicking on the non .edu side.. however they are in some serious talks right now about something happening… Also heads up on adteractive, they are releasing a new “product line” very soon…
QuinStreet should merge w/ NextTag…it makes sense. Both of these companies have been talking about going public for 5+ years, but nothing’s happened. Merger=public=being more competitive in the direct online marketing space