J2 Global Wants to Acquire Carbonite That Confirms Receipt of Unsolicited Proposal

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Founded in 1995 and public since 1999, J2 Global, formerly j2 Global Communications, continues to pursue its tremendous acquisition strategy.

After buying already 47 companies, this time it wants its biggest fish in storage, Carbonite, after a first attempt to get it in 2012 offering $10.50 per share.

Of course, following this press release, the shares of Carbonite jumped, by 23%, the proposal representing a premium of 28% corresponding to $366 million.

Financial results of Carbonite for quarter ended September 30

For the full year of 2014, revenues are expected to be in the range of $122.4 to $122.8 million.

Carbonite, founded in 2005, in Boston, MA, now with around 400 employees, is a provider of hybrid
backup and recovery solutions for businesses, backing up 350 million files every day. It also said to have more than 1.5 million customers, including 50,000 small businesses.

The name of J2 is not known in the storage industry but maybe you have heard of some of the companies acquired since 2010 in online backup in Ireland, UK, the Netherlands and Phoenix, AZ: keepITsafe, Data Haven, C Infinity, Offsite Backup Solutions, Backup Connect, LifeDrive Internet or Offsite Backup Solutions.

But the company has also a strong presence in email, fax, messaging and voice services.

Among all these acquisitions, the prices never were revealed but for probably three most expensive ones: $17 million for Venali, $167 million for Ziff Davis, and $213 million for Protus IP Solutions.

As of December 31, 2013, J2 had achieved 18 consecutive fiscal years of revenue growth. For its most recent 3FQ14 ended September, revenue was up 19.7% to a record $153.0 million compared to $127.8 million in 3FQ13, with $28.8 million net income.

From 3FQ13 to 3FQ14;

• Business cloud services sales increased 16.4% to a record $108.7 million from $93.4 million including online backup up +$11.2 million or +500%, vs. 3FQ13
• Digital media revenue increased 29.3% to a record $43.2 million from $33.4 million.
• IP licensing sales increased to $1.2 million from $1.0 million.

Financial results of J2 Global for quarter ended September

J2 ended the quarter with $684 million in cash and investments after deploying $52.9 million for acquisitions during the last three-month period and regular quarterly dividend payment.

The company was reaffirming its previously announced fiscal 2014 revenue estimate of between $580 and $600 million.

Former acquisitions of J2 Global

* in $ million