Neustar To Acquire .CO Internet

(RTTNews) - Neustar Inc (NSR), a provider of real-time information and analytics, Thursday agreed to acquire Columbia-based .CO Internet S.A.S. and certain associated assets. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

.CO Internet is the exclusive operator of the worldwide registry for Internet addresses with the ".co" top-level domain.

Since its global launch in 2010, names under management for .co have grown to more than 1.6 million in over 200 countries. Neustar has an existing partnership with .CO Internet to provide registry services and infrastructure support for .co extensions, the top-level domain assigned to Colombia.

The acquisition of .CO Internet expands Neustar's registry services, which maintains the .biz and .us top-level domains.

.CO Internet exited 2013 with an annual revenue run-rate of $21 million. However, business combination accounting principles require Neustar to adjust the acquired deferred revenue to fair value.

This adjustment to fair value often results in a write-down of deferred revenue that will reduce future revenue recognized as the services are performed, typically over a one year period.

During 2013, Neustar recorded $4 million in revenue for its role as the back-end provider for .CO Internet, which will be eliminated upon consolidation. In addition, results for the first quarter of 2014 will include pursuit costs associated with this transaction.

Following the acquisition, .CO Internet, as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Neustar, will continue to manage the .co domain extensions from its headquarters in Bogota, Colombia.