NeoMedia returns 12snap for $17M loss

NeoMedia Technologies Inc. continued its retreat from the mobile marketing space, selling the German outfit 12snap for “just under” $5 million.
NeoMedia, which is streamlining in an effort to focus on its “qode” mobile barcode-reading business, bought 12snap last year for roughly $22 million. The Florida-based company will retain a 10-percent stake in 12snap, which was sold to former shareholder Bernd M. Michael.
The move marks at least the third time NeoMedia has taken a former startup to the returns counter. The firm in December jettisoned its Mobot subsidiary; one month earlier NeoMedia agreed to sell U.K.-based mobile software Sponge Ltd. to its founders.
“This sales agreement is central to NeoMedia’s current strategy of selling its non-core divisions,” said interim CEO Chas Fritz, “in order to place its focus solely on its qode and Gavitec AG divisions.”