Ringier buys Romanian real estate portal
Ringier acquires a majority stake in Imobiliare.ro, Romania's largest real estate portal. The acquisition strengthens Ringier's digital portfolio in Romania.
With 103'000 listed properties, Imobiliare.ro is clearly the leading real estate portal among the country's comparable online marketplaces, according to the announcement. With the acquisition of Imobiliare.ro, Ringier Romania is following its global corporate strategy of successively expanding its digital business. Furthermore, synergies with Ringier's existing activities in Romania can be created and expanded.
Ringier acquires 87 percent of the shares in Realmedia Network with the real estate portal Imobiliare.ro. The sellers are the previous owners Broadhurst Investments Limited, Kurt Götz and the managing directors of Imobiliare.ro. The latter will remain involved in the company as minority shareholders and executives.
Marc Walder, CEO Ringier: "The acquisition of Imobiliare.ro is a further step towards consistently transforming and digitizing our portfolio in Eastern Europe as well".
The transaction will be completed as of March 31, 2016. CEO of Imobiliare.ro will remain the current CEO Adrian Mihail Erimescu: "I am very proud that Imobiliare.ro, which was launched 16 years ago as an online project in Timisoara, will now become part of one of the largest media groups in Europe. This transaction will allow us to access international know-how and exploit national as well as global synergies within the Ringier Group. I am very confident that this transaction will allow us to provide even better services to our customers and users and build Imobiliare.ro into a world-class real estate portal."
Ringier has been active in Romania since 1992. Ringier Romania is now one of the country's leading international publishers, with over 400 employees, and operates more than 30 print products and online platforms, including Libertatea, a tabloid newspaper, and the fashion magazine Elle.
