December 14, 2005 Update: Read my latest coverage of Experian’s acquisition of PriceGrabber.

Experian (a subsidiary of GUS Plc) buys PriceGrabber for $485 million. It’s official.

Whoa! What a price. According to the MarketWatch article, PriceGrabber had sales of “roughly $60 million and earnings before interest and tax of $25 million.” I said in a previous report that PriceGrabber should sell at a premium (although I estimated $300 – $400 million) for a number of reasons, but $485 million sounds a little steep.

I’ll go back and look at my notes on the Shopping.com and Shopzilla acquisitions, but just thinking out loud right now…I estimate Shopping.com will do at least $125 million in revenue this year and Shopzila will do at least $140 million in revenue this year…for PriceGrabber to be acquired at nearly the same price as those two companies, but have half the revenue (or less) is a little difficult to understand. But who am I to talk? I’ve been saying for months that this holiday season would be a breakout one for the shopping comparison engines and 2006 would be the year they start to gain respect. If PriceGrabber can grow at a phenomenal rate (and adding Experian’s internet marketing expertise to the mix could easily make this a reality), this deal will seem cheap.

Congratulations to Kamran and his team. PriceGrabber has a great service and some really bright employees.

More to come…Stay tuned.

Recent posts about PriceGrabber
PriceGrabber Autos – For Serious Car Buyers Only – November 30, 2005
Interview with PriceGrabber CEO, Kamran Pourzanjani – November 29