But last week, the group cut off all negotiations with potential buyers, apparently because the price offered- which some reports put at zł.30 million-didn't meet WEH's expectations.
"We still want to sell Gadu-Gadu because this is the financial investor's strategy. But at the moment we are not conducting any talks because none of the offers met all of our criteria, among which the price is most important," said Krzystof Szalwa, vice president of SMS-Express.com and WEH. WEH owns SMS-Express.com, which, in turn, owns Gadu-Gadu.
Although the company has been successful recently, some question whether zł.30 million is too high a price for investors concerned about the stability of new technologies.
"The dotcom bubble burst in Poland a couple years later than in the U.S., so there are still a lot of worries about internet companies," says independent market analyst Tomasz Kulisiewicz. "They were probably asking too much for this period in time." He adds that when dealing with older messenger services, security is always a big concern.
In the end, says Kulisiewicz, WEH may not be so excited to sell Gadu-Gadu after all. "I think that if they had really wanted to sell it, they could have. But they've got a well-established product, and they're not willing to part with it for just anything." n
Andrew Kureth
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