East-European TV net Central European Media Enterprises (CME) is buying Jyxo, operator of Czech blog portal Blog.cz, from founder Michal Illich and investor Centralway for between 163 million and 200 million koruny (£6.4 million). Illich will join CME’s TV Nova as head of technical business development. Nova director Petr Dvorak (via release) said the acquisition will allow it to “quickly engage with online communities that are of interest to our audiences and advertisers“.
Prague-based Jyxo is an internet technology vendor that operates several of its own search products, contextual PPC ad targeting, user-generated encyclopedia Mozek and Blog.cz, a blog host with over 400,000 registered blogs and 2.5 million unique monthly users. Jyxo also runs Czech portal Seznam.cz’s ad platform and operates in Hungary and Slovakia.
The purchase price is dependent on Jyxo hitting targets in the next two years and includes Jyxo’s affiliate Blog Internet, which both made an 11.1 million koruny (£355,608) profit in 2007 on revenue of 17.9 million koruny (£573,458). Illich: “Jyxo and Blog Internet have made great strides over the past six years. Yet, I realised that taking these companies to the next level required a partner not only with a significant audience, but also the advertising expertise to leverage it.” CME, curiously, is based out of Bermuda, listed on the Nasdaq and operates TV channels across eastern Europe.