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Spark Networks is looking to sell its Jewish online dating site JDate.com. Reports via Reuters are surfacing that the company has been in talks with several leading social networks and web dating communities. eHarmony may be looking to take on the niche dating site, as well as MySpace, and IAC, which already owns Match.com and has recently shifted gears to grow smaller, more focused efforts for its various entities. While these reports have not been confirmed, the interest from any one of these companies could easily be taken seriously for such an acquisition.
[img src="" caption="" credit="" alt=""]So what's the price tag? The site could go for about $185 million, based on analysts' estimates, which would offer up a 40% premium based on Spark's closing share prices on Thursday. With several other niche dating sites under its umbrella and a 5% drop in revenue for the first 9 months of 2007, Spark may be looking to start selling off some of its dating sites as the niche groups lose market share to the larger dating networks. With the success of JDate, Spark has seen about half of its revenue coming from its Jewish Networks division, with nearly 100,000 paying subscribers.