Opinion ID: 3038415
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: trs and the prio-infospace merger

Text: In the late 1990s, TRS, a subsidiary of the American Express Company, made strategic equity investments in various e-commerce companies. During this period, TRS became a significant minority investor in Prio, Inc. In December 1999, Prio entered a merger agreement with InfoSpace in which InfoSpace agreed to issue 5.37 million shares of stock, worth about $400 million, to buy Prio from its former shareholders. InfoSpace provides infrastructure services for wireless, wireline and broadband platforms. David House joined the InfoSpace board of directors in January 2000, which was after the merger agreement was executed but before the merger closed. When appointed to the InfoSpace board, House was a TRS executive officer who had served as a Prio director just before the merger was announced. House served as an InfoSpace director for 16 months, through May 2001. Before joining the board, House himself owned no shares of InfoSpace. The merger closed February 25, 2000, and Prio was integrated into InfoSpace. As of the merger, TRS owned about 12% of Prio, but after the merger, TRS owned less than 10% of InfoSpace’s shares. According to Dreiling, just after the merger agreement, InfoSpace’s share price increased by DREILING v. AMERICAN EXPRESS CO. 9569 350%, only to lose almost 80% in value during the six months after the merger was completed.