Who owns the genealogy companies? -- a comment

In my last post, I talked about Ancestry.com. One of my readers pointed out that Ancestry.com is now publicly traded on the Nasdaq stock exchange. Underwriters for the deal included Morgan Stanley, Bank of America-Merrill Lynch, BMO Capital Markets Corp., Jefferies & Co. and Piper Jaffray & Co. It will trade under the symbol "ACOM" on the Nasdaq Global Market. It is interesting to note that the amount raised by the stock sale, estimated to be $100 million, was about 1/3 of what was invested by Spectrum Equity Investors. 


Here is the official statement from Ancestry.com's annual report for 26 February 2010:

We operated as The Generations Network, Inc., which we refer to as the predecessor, until December 5, 2007. On December 5, 2007, Generations Holding, Inc., which we refer to as the successor, acquired The Generations Network, Inc. in connection with an investment by Spectrum Equity Investors V, L.P. and certain of its affiliates. The successor was created for the sole purpose of acquiring The Generations Network, Inc. and had no prior operations. Immediately following that transaction, which we refer to as the Spectrum investment, Spectrum and certain of its affiliates held approximately 67% of the outstanding shares of our common stock. In July 2009, to better align our corporate identity with the premier branding of Ancestry.com, Generations Holding changed its name to Ancestry.com Inc. Primarily as a result of the consummation of our initial public offering in November, 2009, Spectrum's ownership percentage was reduced. Spectrum and certain of its affiliates now hold approximately 55% of the outstanding shares of our common stock. As a result of the accounting for the Spectrum investment, our fiscal year 2007 is divided into a predecessor period from January 1, 2007 through December 5, 2007 and a successor period from December 6, 2007 through December 31, 2007.

It is clear that control of the company from its owners has not changed due to the issuance of a public stock offering. I might further note that Ancestry.com traded at about $14.00 a share or so at the time of the public offering and the present price of the stock is trading at about $19.00 a share.

Thanks for pointing out the public offering, but sale of a minority interest does not change the ownership of the company.