Wednesday February 7 8:33 AM ET
AOL May Float AOL Europe, But Not Yet
FRANKFURT (Reuters) - America Online (NYSE:AOL - news), the world's largest Internet service provider, may float its unit AOL Europe but only if market conditions improve, the president of AOL International was reported on Wednesday as saying.
``A flotation of AOL Europe is clearly an option for us,'' Michael Lynton told German business daily Handelsblatt in an interview. He would not give a timetable for a listing and said market conditions would have to be better than they are now.
Lynton would not predict when AOL Europe would be profitable but added that AOL's business model of generating income from access fees, advertising revenues and e-commerce was paying off.
Handelsblatt cited market research by MMXI which said AOL customers spend about four times longer surfing the Web than clients of German rival T-Online AG (TOIGn.DE). ``Therefore these customers are more valuable to us,'' Lynton said.
The newspaper also said that according to a study by HSBC Trinkaus, AOL's Internet portal earned more advertising revenue in Germany than any other portal.
Its revenue at 52 million euros exceeded T-Online's 47 million euros and Yahoo's (NasdaqNM:YHOO - news) 29 million, according to HSBC Trinkaus estimates.
Lynton confirmed that the estimate for AOL's advertising revenue was not far off the mark.
America Online is part of AOL Time Warner Inc.
AOL May Float AOL Europe, But Not Yet
FRANKFURT (Reuters) - America Online (NYSE:AOL - news), the world's largest Internet service provider, may float its unit AOL Europe but only if market conditions improve, the president of AOL International was reported on Wednesday as saying.
``A flotation of AOL Europe is clearly an option for us,'' Michael Lynton told German business daily Handelsblatt in an interview. He would not give a timetable for a listing and said market conditions would have to be better than they are now.
Lynton would not predict when AOL Europe would be profitable but added that AOL's business model of generating income from access fees, advertising revenues and e-commerce was paying off.
Handelsblatt cited market research by MMXI which said AOL customers spend about four times longer surfing the Web than clients of German rival T-Online AG (TOIGn.DE). ``Therefore these customers are more valuable to us,'' Lynton said.
The newspaper also said that according to a study by HSBC Trinkaus, AOL's Internet portal earned more advertising revenue in Germany than any other portal.
Its revenue at 52 million euros exceeded T-Online's 47 million euros and Yahoo's (NasdaqNM:YHOO - news) 29 million, according to HSBC Trinkaus estimates.
Lynton confirmed that the estimate for AOL's advertising revenue was not far off the mark.
America Online is part of AOL Time Warner Inc.
