EasyDate looking to raise cash as well as heart-rates

AN online dating company is considering a flotation as it looks to raise at least £10 million for acquisitions in Europe.

EasyDate, chaired by technology entrepreneur Bill Dobbie, is operating in one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy.

However, it is also a fragmented sector and the Edinburgh-based firm wants to be among the consolidators.

Dobbie and chief executive Max Polyakov, a 32-year-old Ukrainian graduate, are talking to brokers and other advisers, including KPMG and McGrigors, in Scotland and London about raising finance by the early summer.

They are considering either institutional funding or admission to the Alternative Investment Market.

Targets have been identified, mainly in France, but also in the US where the firm already has a 50:50 joint venture.

"It is about buying databases and local knowledge," said Dobbie, who believes an Aim flotation could value the company at upwards of 50m.

He was a director of Demon Internet and founder investor in Scottish technology firm iomart, while Polyakov was Scotland's entrepreneur of the year in the Ernst & Young awards.

The biggest company in the dating sector is US firm match.com which has revenues of $300m, followed by the French company Meetic.fr which has income of about half that sum.

Easydate, with forecast revenue this year of 18m to 20m, trades via a number of websites such as DatetheUK.com, which is reckoned to have three million profiles, and the cheekier BeNaughty.com and ClickandFlirt.com.

EasyDate was launched in 2002 and last year entered the Deloitte Fast 50 with a five-year growth rate of 1,063 per cent and average monthly revenue growth of 7 per cent in 2009.