Think Partnership Buys Expecting Family Site with Newly Granted Credit

Think Partnership, parent to a panoply of online and offline marketing businesses, has completed the purchase of Morex Marketing, which operates a site to connect marketers with expectant parents. Funds from a new credit facility enabled the deal.

Morex, which claims annual pre-tax earnings of around $3 million, was purchased for approximately $21 million in cash and stock. Previous Morex owners are eligible for an additional $28 million in earnout payments of cash and stock, if the division increases its annual pretax earnings to $12.5 million by 2008.

Lead-generation company Morex runs Babytobee.com, a site where expectant parents can sign up to receive free samples of products and services. The site serves marketers looking to generate trial usage and establish long-term brand loyalties with new parents. Morex founders Lloyd Ecker and Robert Moore will remain co-CEOs under multi-year employment agreements.

Since acquisition plans were first announced in July, Morex acquired Catamount Group, which enhances the company’s lead generation business to include online and offline capabilities. Catamount brokers online lead generation to the offline direct marketing industry.

Funds for the purchase came from a $17.5 million credit facility — in the form of a loan and line of credit — from Wachovia Bank. Think Partnership used $7.5 million of the facility to immediately pay back an existing debt to Wachovia. The remainder of the funds went toward the acquisition.

The addition of Morex to the company fold and the repayment of debt are an apparent prelude to future financial developments. In a statement, Think Partnership CEO Gerard Jacobs called this, “the first of several steps we intend to take during 2006 in regard to the financing of our growing company.”

The newly acquired property joins an existing stable of 12 operating companies resulting from a string of acquisitions. Most recently Think acquired contextual targeting engine Crystal Reference.

Think Partnership is in the process of gathering shareholder approval for a name change from CGI Holding Corporation. Until that time it operates under the proposed name.