Train route search service, Ekitan will go public on TSE Mothers /Venture Now

Ekitan accepted IPO on Mothers from Tokyo Stock Exchange. The planned date is March 3rd.

Major investors are Polaris Capital Group (60.99%), Fuji Media Holdings (13.21%), Increment P (8.64%), Ekitan (5.87%). Toshiba (4.73%) and five board members (6.56%).

Ekitan started in 1997 as an internal venture of Toshiba and was spun off as a 100% subsidiary in 2003 January. At the end of October of 2007, Polaris and management of Ekitan conducted MBO.

Ekitan Mobile has 851,657 paid-users and 1,751,579 free users. The revenue of a fiscal year ending March 2010 is 2,429 million yen, and the operating profit is 511 million yen.

Venture Now 1/27/2011

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• There are some competitors in train route search service, such as Jorudan or NaviTime. Jorudan has already got IPO.