Just hours after Switchboard Inc. announced the end of its white pages contract with America Online Inc., the online service announced a new directory deal with rival InfoSpace.
AOL said it chose to make a three-year, multi-million dollar deal with
InfoSpace
for what it termed, “an effective tool for better connecting the millions
of people within the AOL community.” The new directory service will be
featured on AOL, AOL.com, and the company’s Digital City local guide.
Switchboard, which continues to provide the White Pages for AOL until its
contract runs out in November, today said it wanted to focus more on
expanding its own site.
AOL said it will receive guaranteed minimum annual payments and warrants to
purchase shares of InfoSpace.com. Financial specifics were not disclosed.
“We are very excited to team up with InfoSpace.com to bring our members
and the millions more who use AOL.COM and Digital City this valuable new
search feature,” said Barry Schuler, president of AOL Interactive
Services.
“Our agreement with America Online offers us a tremendous opportunity to
extend
InfoSpace.com’s award winning directory services and brand to the only
truly mass market community online,” said Naveen Jain, CEO of
InfoSpace.com. “This new relationship is a homerun for both companies, as
well as for AOL’s members and Internet visitors to
AOL.COM and Digital City.”
This has been a busy week for InfoSpace, which filed an initial public
offering for up to $57.5 million in common stock yesterday.
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