Online dating company Cupid (LON:CUP) has acquired a 75 percent stake in two German online businesses, OnlineLiebe GmbH and WomenWeb GmbH, for a total of €2.75 million (£2.5million). The two companies are run together by the same team in Munich, led by founder Andreas von Maltzan, who is recognised as one of the pioneers and leaders in the German dating market, having established Neu.de, Germany’s most popular dating site, which was sold to Meetic in 2007. Andreas has a track record of producing successful German online businesses and will continue to run the German sites.

OnlineLiebe GmbH is a recently created niche online dating provider with sites such as Zuckerjungs.de, Zuckerdaddys.de, Gleicheliebe.de and Gayjz.de. Its leading site, Zuckerjungs.de, was founded last year and has already become the market leader in the ‘Cougar’ dating niche in Germany, as well as in Austria and Switzerland where the sites are called Zuckerburschen.at and Zuckerjungs.ch respectively.

WomenWeb GmbH is Germany's largest online community network of female interest websites with domains such as Womenweb.de, Frauen.de, Kochrezepte.de, Allegraclub.de, Esoteriktreff.de, Hochzeits-club.de and eight other portals. WomenWeb GmbH also provides online communities for a number of well-known German women’s magazines such as Petra, Fuersie, Vital, Plus-Magazin and Frau im Leben.

The remaining 25% of the business is owned by a combination of Media Ventures GmbH and Andreas von Maltzan. Media Ventures, owned jointly by Dirk Stroer, of Deutsche-Boerse-listed Stroer Out-of-Home Media AG (SAXG.DE), has agreed to inject a multi-million Euro advertising budget into billboard advertising in Germany for the sites over the next three years. Cupid said the acquisition would enable it to combine its strength in online marketing with the existing local expertise of the Munich based team and the German billboard advertising strength of Stroer Out-of-Home Media AG to target rapid expansion in Germany.

The combined purchase price of €2.75m (£2.5m) for 75% of the equity of both companies will be paid within the next two weeks. A mechanism has been agreed to value both companies at 1.7 times revenues, should Cupid wish to purchase the remaining 25% of the equity in both companies. This option can be exercised by Cupid, at its sole discretion, between 1 January 2012 and 31 December 2014. The combined businesses delivered revenues of approximately €0.85 million in 2010 and a loss of €0.18 million.…

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