CentralNic bulks up its monetization business.
CentralNic is acquiring Codewise, which operates Voluum. Voluum allows affiliate marketers to managed and track their ad campaigns.
Domain name rollup CentralNic (London AIM: CNIC) announced that it is acquiring Codewise, which is a collection of advertising and domain monetization companies, for $36 million.
The acquisition adds to the company’s domain monetization arm that was created with the acquisition of Team Internet.
Codewise operates ZeroPark and Voluum. The company was founded by an ex-employee of Elephant Traffic, a zero-click company that later sold its customer base to Team Internet.
I covered ZeroPark when it launched in 2013. Currently, the company offers three ad formats: domain redirects (zero-click), push notifications, and popups.
Voluum is an ad campaign management system.
Both of the companies are geared to affiliate marketers. Affiliate marketers, who get paid commissions for referring customers, can buy traffic on ZeroPark. They then manage ad campaigns (including campaigns from other ad networks) on Voluum.
Together, the businesses count 6,000 customers.
The acquisition should help CentralNic diversify its monetization business, which is heavily reliant on Google. Google accounted for 92% of the company’s monetization revenue in the first half of this year.
Codewise generated $60.3 million in revenue in the 12 months through June 30, and an adjusted EBITDA of $7.4 million. CentralNic believes it can cut costs by at least $1 million by combining it with its other monetization services.
The acquisition will significantly grow CentralNic’s headcount. It plans to add 140 people from Codewise.
CentralNic will pay for the acquisition by issuing £30 million of new shares.
Source: (https://domainnamewire.com/)
