From Reuters " Exclusive: Providence Equity explores Ironman parent sale: sources"

very interesting Brian, thanks for posting.

I am not a finance guy so I might be misinformed in my comments but it seems they are looking into either selling for a nice profit or making an IPO so regular folks like us can invest in the company. Either way, they are going to make money correct?

I would be interested in hearing from some of the business people on this site what they think about it. To me, seems like a smart business play and can't fault them for that. If someone does buy it, hopefully things don't deteriorate.

Private equity investment usually has a life cycle with that life cycle ending when the investors think they can maximize the profit.

Either a private sale or a public offering. They goal is the same maximize returns.

This is an accurate assessment. PE firms are generally not long term investors. They often have a stable of firms they invest in with the expectation that a few will be home runs so they can give the investors a good return on the portfolio. No deal is ever done just to buy and hold as a general rule. They always have an exit strategy in mind.

The choice of straight sale or IPO is a function of how long they think they can ride the horse. If initiating a liquidity event now gets them a return of X the decision on IPO v sale is a function of what they think they can do with the proceeds. If they think the stock will continue to grow at their internal hurdle rate they will do that while returning to the investors some of their investment. If they think it will not grow at that rate, they will exit completely from the deal one way or another and reinvest back into the portfolio with another purchase.

If I were a betting man I would expect this to be a full exit strategy.