For sale: Friends Reunited

NEWS The founder of Friends Reunited has admitted he is looking for a buyer for the massively popular contact site. The phenomenal success of the site, which puts old school and university friends in touch with one another, has seen it sign up eight million users to date, largely thanks to word of mouth and media coverage. Those users wishing to contact old friends, foes and flames via email were required to pay £5 per year - ensuring the company, which launched with very little capital expenditure, was soon making money. While founders Steve and Julia Pankhurst often claimed they had no plans to float the company, and maintained it as a traditional business - without operating in debt or on venture capital money - Steve Pankhurst told the Sunday Times he is now considering a number of options for the business - valued at around £25m - one of which is a sale. Pankhurst told the newspaper that advisers BDO Stoy Hayward has been appointed, adding: "In the past 18 months we have had many parties interested and we are reviewing all our options with BDO. We are quite advanced in the process." Since establishing itself as a cultural phenomenon Friends Reunited has been trading on its popularity, even releasing a CD of pop music from yesteryear. It has also looked to branch out into new territory, including running similar sites overseas as well as related services such as providing online family trees.