Ancestry.com expects to raise $100 million in IPO

Genealogy Web site Ancestry.com Inc. plans to sell about 7.4 million shares in an IPO to raise about $100 million.

The Provo, Utah-based company expects to price the shares between $12.50 and $14.50 apiece. Underwriters are being offered up to an additional 1.1 million shares to cover overallotments, which would boost total proceeds to about $115 million.

About 45 percent of the shares will come from existing shareholders, the company said. Private equity firm Spectrum Equity Investors, through its affiliated funds, will own about 54.8 percent of the outstanding stock following the offering.

Ancestry.com plans to use net proceeds of about $48.4 million for general corporate purposes and to repay debt. The company said it may also use a portion to expand through acquisitions or investments in technologies.

Founded in 1983 as Ancestry Inc., the company started out publishing books to help genealogy buffs research family lineage and moved to Web-based documents and tools.

With more than 600 employees, Ancestry.com was spun off from The Generations Network, a group of businesses offering other Web tools, DNA testing services and Ancestry magazine.

The company, which has more than 1 million paying subscribers, said revenue jumped from $122.6 million in 2004 to $197.6 million in 2008. It earned $8.1 million in the first half of the year on revenue of nearly $100 million.

The president, CEO and director of the company, Timothy Sullivan, was president and CEO of Match.com, a dating site run by Internet company IAC/InterActiveCorp., before joining Ancestry.com in 2005.

Underwriters for the deal include Morgan Stanley, BMO Capital Markets Corp., Jefferies & Company, Inc., Piper Jaffray & Co., and Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc.

Ancestry.com expects to trade under the symbol "ACOM" on the Nasdaq Global Market.