IAC buys People Media for $80 mln

Barry Diller gets a seemingly good property for a low price

Barry Diller's Match.com is buying People Media, an operator of 20 vertically oriented dating sites,from American Capital Ltd for $80 million in cash.

The deal, which was first reported by Paidcontent.org, allows Match to go deep into verticals, such as AsianPeopleMeet.com, LoveandSeek.com (Christian), BlackPeopleMeet.com, LDSPlanet.com, SingleParentMeet.com, and SeniorPeopleMeet.com. PeopleMedia has a combined 255,000 paying subscribers, and attracted four million unique visitors in May, not too far off from Match.com's five million uniques.

It appears IAC, which owns Match.com, is getting a good deal. People Media earned $11.6 million in 2008, before depreciation and amortization, making $80 million a relatively low multiple to pay. Based on some quick math, Google and Amazon trade over 20 times EBITDA.