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Infoserve heads for AIM

Article Date:  Jun 15 2006 Elliott Davis


Infoserve, the operator of online local business directories, is eyeing an AIM launch in the coming weeks and plans to raise up to £2 million with the aid of broker WH Ireland. The cash obtained will be invested in recruiting and expanding the group’s sales team.

Based in Leeds, the company currently operates 130 websites itself and powers 150 more, providing contact details for over 2.7 million UK businesses. Via these sites, users can search for everything from plumbers in Peterborough to accountants in Aberystwyth.

Infoserve makes its money providing premium listings to those included in its database, selling advertising space on its sites and also from various commercial agreements with The Daily Telegraph and Metro and Sky TV amongst others.

‘We currently have 11,000 paying customers,’ managing director Steve Barnes notes with regard to the premium listings, ‘but we hope to get this up to 80,000 before too long.’ Post-flotation the cash raised will be used to help drive this ambition, Barnes adding that ‘we currently have 120 sales people and plan to recruit ten more a month. I see room for around 500 in the UK without saturation.’

The group is expected to be valued at around £4 million when trading begins on or around 23 June.

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