Lycos Buys Its Trademarks Back From Failed Euro Arm
This story was written by Robert Andrews.
Just another footnote to the failure of the black-dog portal - the German-based company is selling its trademarks for Lycos, Tripod, Angelfire and Hotbot back to the main Lycos Inc in the US. While continuing to make losses, Lycos Europe in 2007 paid Lycos Inc $5.2 million to renew its license to use the brand, despite entering the US itself under a completely different name, Jubii. The company put itself up for sale last year but gave up and is liquidating itself. The trademark buy-back came during last week's shareholders' AGM, which must have been a pretty morose affair
In asset stripping, it's managed to off-load its Jubii Denmark, United Domains and Shopping businesses, and even struck a deal to rescue Tripod from closure just days before a shutdown deadline. German magazine and digital publisher Hubert Burda Media has bought Lycos iQ. Next in the fire sale before the dog is put to sleep - the Pangora ecommerce network. CFO Fred Wilsdorf has been put in place as CEO, until such time as Lycos Europe is wound down entirely, replacing Bertelsmann heir Christoph Mohn.
By Robert Andrews