The Times/ delivers the background numbers of the recent Corbis/Zefa deal ("Corbis snaps up third-largest image catalogue"):
The deal, estimated at €56 million (£39 million), shores up Corbis’s status as the secondbiggest photograph owner, amid speculation that Mr Gates, the founder of Microsoft, is poised to announce a flotation of the company with a valuation that could exceed $1 billion (£530.7 million).
Annual sales at Corbis, which owns more than 70 million images, will rise above $200 million following the acquisition of Zefa. The German catalogue, which is the last major independent image library in the world, has sales of about €32.5 million.
Getty Images ... The company, which is about 20 per cent owned by the Getty Trust, is worth $4 billion — implying a valuation for Corbis of between a third and a half of Getty Images.
Zefa was jointly owned by Erwin Fey, 3i, the UK venture capital group, and its management. Herr Fey will take about €28 million for his 51 per cent stake, while 3i has more than trebled its initial investment of about €8 million, which it made in 1998.
