R.H. Donnelley gets some dot-com magic

The rumors were true; Business.com was in play. And today we know the buyer: R.H. Donnelley (NYSE: RHD).

The deal comes to about $345 million.

Like other dot-coms, it hasn't been easy. The company got its start back in 1999 and spent a cool $7.5 million for the Business.com domain name. Over the years, Business.com has built a solid and profitable business, with about $50 million in revenues.

As for R.H. Donnelley, it's a must-have deal. With the traditional Yellow Pages threatened by players like Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and even Craigslist, the company certainly needs a digital strategy.

Also, with the scale of Donnelly, the Business.com footprint should get a boost. And I bet we'll see some more dealmaking.

But investors are not happy about the price tag. So far today, shares of Donnelly are down nearly 9% to $66.60.

For some more recent M&A transactions, click here.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.