And the tech deals just keep on coming.
For example, back on April Fools' Day Salt Lake City-based STSN announced that it had acquired Mycall, based in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Although the price of the all-stock transaction was not disclosed by either party, an STSN spokesman said the acquisition was driven by STSN's desire "to increase (its) success in continental Europe."
Founded in 1999, MyCall primarily provides in-lobby computers to allow guests in 4- and 5-star hotels in Europe to log onto the Internet for a fee.
With the help of one merger and an acquisition of its own last year (MyCall merged with United Kingdom-based InTouch in July, and the combined entity acquired Germany-based Webmax in October), MyCall had grown to the point that its systems are in more than 1,000 European hotels.
As part of the acquisition, STSN gains legal entities in six European countries, as well as MyCall operations in 12 countries: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
According to Steve Harmsen, STSN's vice president of corporate development, the MyCall acquisition immediately gives STSN a veritable foot in the door with more than 1,000 hotels in Europe.
Through a relationship started with MyCall in July 2003, STSN is now offering in-room Internet access in roughly 5 percent of the MyCall hotel properties, Harmsen said.
In less than a year, traveler access to the Internet through STSN-powered connections has more than doubled to 265,000 guest rooms worldwide today, up from 130,000 guest rooms in July 2003.
Although STSN had already gained a substantial foothold into Europe prior to the MyCall acquisition, "This (the MyCall acquisition) will allow us to do this (expand throughout Europe) at a faster pace," Harmsen said.
Given that the MyCall hotels support close to a quarter million guest rooms, the MyCall acquisition appears to give STSN an inside track to significantly increasing its network footprint.
On a separate front, last week saw the completion of the $82 million sale of Authorize.Net by Lightbridge (Nasdaq: LTBG) from InfoSpace (Nasdaq: INSP).
American Fork-based Authorize.Net became part of InfoSpace in October 2000 when INSP acquired Go2Net (then Nasdaq: GNET) in an all-stock transaction valued at a $1.3 billion. (Authorize.Net had previously been acquired by Go2Net in July 1999 for $90.5 million, $13.5 million in cash and the balance in stock.)
Although on first glance it might seem that nobody wants Authorize.Net and its Internet payment gateway solutions, systems that allow approximately 91,000 small- to mid-size merchants to accept credit card and electronic check payments online. However, that is not the case.
InfoSpace has, in fact, decided to tighten its focus to two areas: Search & Directory, as well as Mobile, solutions that do not include or require payment gateways.
For its part, Lightbridge gains Authorize.Net's $27.8 million annual business, which generated $6.9 million in profits for INSP in 2003, profits that would have pushed Lightbridge "into the black" in 2003.
With Authorize.Net under its wing, Lightbridge will be able to expand its business-to-business offerings into the online payment systems arena, giving it additional strength and tightening its hold on its customers.
Lightbridge intends to keep the Authorize.Net headquarters in Utah, along with its satellite office in Bellevue, Wash.
One last transaction announcement that caught my eye last week came from FX Energy (Nasdaq: FXEN) as the company unveiled plans for a sale of 2.5 million shares of common stock to institutional investors in Europe.
Even at a discount to last week's closing price of $7.87 per share, the Salt Lake City-based energy exploration and development company should bank north of $15 million if the transactions proceed as outlined. I guess we'll see.
David Politis leads Politis Communications, a public relations, investor relations and marketing communications agency specializing in the high-tech and life science markets. E-MAIL: dpolitis@politis.com.