SEAT Pagine Gialle
The domain seat.it was registered in the first generation of .it names, before 29 January 1996.1
The first archived snapshot, from March 1997, showed only a placeholder page — "Welcome to the SEAT site" — belonging to the publishing group behind the Pagine Gialle (Yellow Pages).2
In December 2018 the site recounted its own change of ownership: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A. from the Avenue Capital and Golden Tree funds, rising to 80.23% after a tender offer concluded on 6 November 2015; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle resulted in the combined company being named Italiaonline S.p.A.3
The name seat.it is today in the hands of Volkswagen Group Italia S.p.A., paid for until 12 June 2027: in March 2025 the address displayed the promotions of the Spanish carmaker SEAT, while paginegialle.it and tuttocitta.it — the other brands of the former publisher — remain the property of Italiaonline.14
From the 1970s to the creation of Seat-Pagine Gialle Spa in 1998
In January 1979 Seat, the company that handled, among other things, the printing of the "pagine gialle" (yellow pages), announced the hiring of 40 new employees by the end of the year, 10 of them from the youth unemployment lists, the first point of an agreement signed with the trade unions.
In March 1987 the Seat company in Turin, then part of the Iri-Stet group with 3,600 employees and estimated revenue of 620 billion lire in 1986, publisher of the telephone directories and the "pagine gialle", signed a technology transfer agreement with the American company Donnelly.
In September 1998 Seat Spa, publisher of the directories of Telecom subscribers, merged by incorporation into its parent company Ottobi Spa: the new company, based in Turin, took the name "Seat-Pagine Gialle Spa"; Salvatore Sardo was appointed chairman.
From the 40 new hires of 1979 to the creation of Seat-Pagine Gialle in 1998
On 26 January 1979 Seat, "the company that handles, among other things, the printing of the 'pagine gialle'", announced the hiring of 40 new employees by the end of the year, 10 of them from the youth unemployment lists, under an agreement signed with the trade unions.1 In 1987 Seat in Turin, then part of the Iri-Stet group with 3,600 employees and estimated revenue of 620 billion lire for 1986, publisher of the telephone directories and the "pagine gialle", transferred technology to the American company Donnelly.2 On 9 September 1998 Seat Spa merged by incorporation into its parent company Ottobi Spa, which took the name "Seat-Pagine Gialle Spa", based in Turin, with Salvatore Sardo as chairman.3
The domain seat.it from 1997 to 2025: from the Italiaonline acquisition to the car brand
The site seat.it, in the first known snapshot of 27 March 1997, showed itself with the simple wording "Welcome to the SEAT site". A snapshot from 22 December 2018, with the site renamed "Seat - Italiaonline", recounts that on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A. through the contribution of the shares held by Avenue Capital and the Golden Tree Funds, a stake that rose to 80.23% on 6 November 2015 at the end of the tender offer; on 20 June 2016 Italiaonline S.p.A. merged by reverse merger into Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., which in turn took the name Italiaonline S.p.A.
A snapshot from 19 March 2025 shows that the domain seat.it is no longer linked to the telephone-directory company: it redirects to seat-italia.it, the Italian site of the Spanish car brand SEAT, with price lists and sales promotions.
The site seat.it after the merger into Italiaonline
The copies of the site seat.it collected by the Web Archive between 2019 and 2020 no longer show the contents of the directory service, but a notice about the corporate affair: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquires 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that, on 6 November 2015, at the end of a tender offer, rises to 80.23%. On 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle becomes effective; in the process it takes the name Italiaonline S.p.A. and redirects visitors to the site italiaonline.it.1
The domain seat.it, from SEAT to Italiaonline
The domain seat.it, in the first copy traced by the Web Archive on 27 March 1997, is still a simple welcome page for the SEAT site.1 From 2019 the site reports the subsequent corporate history: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., as a result of the contribution to Italiaonline of the shares held in Seat Pagine Gialle Italia S.p.A.2
From the name SEAT to Italiaonline (2015-2016)
On 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle takes legal effect; in the course of the transaction the company changes its own name to Italiaonline S.p.A. The domain seat.it, which in the first snapshot traced, from 27 March 1997, showed only a welcome message, has since then carried this account of the corporate merger in place of a standalone company site.
The site seat.it in the web archive
The domain seat.it appears parked in the first available snapshot, from 27 March 1997 ("Welcome to the SEAT site"). With the group's move to Italiaonline, the site is documented as active under the name "Seat - Italiaonline" from 14 March 2019 until at least 1 January 2020.
The domain seat.it after the Italiaonline acquisition
A snapshot of seat.it from 14 March 2019 reports that on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. had acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rose to 80.23% as of 6 November 2015 after a tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle gave the resulting company the name Italiaonline S.p.A. The first snapshot of the domain, from 27 March 1997, showed only the parking page "Welcome to the SEAT site".
The domain seat.it, from Seat to Italiaonline
The domain seat.it is documented in the web archive from 27 March 1997. The last snapshot with the same content dates back to 1 January 2020, with a link to the new site www.italiaonline.it.
The domain seat.it and the merger with Italiaonline (2015-2016)
The domain seat.it, reduced in the first snapshot of 27 March 1997 to a simple welcome notice, documents in the snapshot of 14 March 2019 the end of SEAT as a company name: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquires 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rose to 80.23% on 6 November 2015 at the end of a tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline S.p.A. into Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A. becomes effective, and in the transaction it changes its own name to Italiaonline S.p.A. The same text still appears in the last snapshot of the site, from 1 January 2020, which links to the Italiaonline site.
The domain seat.it in the web archive and the Italiaonline acquisition (1997-2020)
The snapshots from 2019 and 2020 document the corporate transition: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquires 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., as a result of the contribution of the shares held by Avenue Capital and the Golden Tree Funds; as of 6 November 2015, following the conclusion of a tender offer, Italiaonline's stake in Seat Pagine Gialle rises further.
The site seat.it in the web archive: from the Italiaonline acquisition to the reverse merger (1997-2020)
The later snapshots show that on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., following the contribution to Italiaonline of the shares held by Avenue Capital and the Golden Tree Funds; as of 6 November 2015, after the conclusion of the tender offer, Italiaonline's stake in Seat Pagine Gialle had risen to 80.23%. On 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle took legal effect, and in the process the company changed its own name to Italiaonline S.p.A.; the site, still reachable at the address seat.it at least until 1 January 2020, redirected visitors to www.italiaonline.it.
The domain seat.it in the web archive
A page from 14 March 2019 reconstructs its end as an independent company: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquires 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rose to 80.23% on 6 November 2015 after a tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle takes effect, and as part of the merger it changes its name, taking the name Italiaonline S.p.A.
The site seat.it: the merger with Italiaonline and the loss of the name (2015-2019)
The first snapshot of the site seat.it in the web archive dates back to 27 March 1997. The page archived on 14 March 2019 recounts the stages of the brand's end: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A.; as of 6 November 2015, after a tender offer, the stake rose to 80.23%; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle took legal effect, with the resulting company taking the name Italiaonline S.p.A.
The site seat.it in 2019: the reverse merger with Italiaonline
The domain seat.it, already online in March 1997 with just the welcome wording "Welcome to the SEAT site", presents itself in March 2019 as an Italiaonline site: the page recalls that on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle, rising to 80.23% after the tender offer concluded on 6 November 2015, up to the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle, effective from 20 June 2016, through which the company changed its own name to Italiaonline S.p.A.
The domain seat.it and the merger with Italiaonline (2015-2016)
The same text still appeared in the snapshot of 1 January 2020.
The first seat.it site (1997)
The first capture of the domain seat.it in the archive, from 27 March 1997, showed a simple welcome page ("Welcome to the SEAT site"), almost twenty years before the merger with Italiaonline.
The domain seat.it: from the Pagine Gialle showcase to the redirect to Italiaonline (1997-2020)
The first copy of the domain seat.it, from 27 March 1997, shows only a welcome page with no content. In the copy of 14 March 2019, unchanged until the last working copy of 1 January 2020, the domain publishes only a corporate notice: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A. from the Avenue Capital and Golden Tree funds, rising to 80.23% on 6 November 2015 at the end of a tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle took legal effect, with the resulting company taking the name Italiaonline S.p.A., to whose site visitors are redirected.
The domain seat.it: from the 1997 welcome page to the merger into Italiaonline
The first snapshot of seat.it, from 27 March 1997, is a simple welcome page with just the text "Welcome to the SEAT site". A snapshot from 14 March 2019 instead documents the outcome of the corporate affair: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. had acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rose to 80.23% as of 6 November 2015 at the end of a Tender Offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle took legal effect, with the resulting company taking the name Italiaonline S.p.A. Since then, the domain seat.it redirects visitors to a notice pointing them to www.italiaonline.it.
From the 1997 greeting to the reverse merger into Italiaonline (2015-2016)
The first snapshot of the site seat.it, from 27 March 1997, is limited to the message "Welcome to the SEAT site".
In the version of 14 March 2019 the site recounts the corporate developments of the preceding years: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. had acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rose to 80.23% as of 6 November 2015 after a tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline S.p.A. into Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A. became effective, with the company simultaneously taking the name Italiaonline S.p.A., redirecting visitors to the site www.italiaonline.it.
The site seat.it and the acquisition by Italiaonline (1997-2019)
The domain seat.it has been online since 27 March 1997.
Italiaonline's entry into the share capital (2015)
According to what the site seat.it reported, on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., following the contribution to Italiaonline of the Seat Pagine Gialle shares held by Avenue Capital and the Golden Tree funds; as of 6 November 2015 Italiaonline's stake in Seat Pagine Gialle had changed further.
From seat.it to Italiaonline
In the snapshot of 27 March 1997, seat.it presents itself with the simple wording "Welcome to the SEAT site". In the snapshot of 14 March 2019 the site states that, on 9 September 2015, Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A. as a result of the contribution to Italiaonline of the shares already held in Seat Pagine Gialle; the same page remains online at least until the snapshot of 1 January 2020.
The site seat.it, from the 1997 welcome page to Italiaonline
In the snapshot of 27 March 1997 the site seat.it presents itself as SEAT's welcome page. In the snapshot of 14 March 2019 the site states that on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., and in the last live snapshot, from 1 January 2020, the brand now appears as "Seat - Italiaonline".
The site seat.it, from the 1997 welcome page to the Italiaonline acquisition
In the snapshot of 27 March 1997 the site seat.it shows only the wording "Welcome to the SEAT site".
From seat.it to the Italiaonline acquisition
The site seat.it, collected by the web archive since March 1997, went from being the official site of Seat Pagine Gialle to a page of the Italiaonline group: according to the 2019-2020 snapshots, on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. had acquired 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., as a result of the contribution of the shares held by Avenue Capital and the Golden Tree funds.
The domain seat.it, taken over by Italiaonline in 2015
The domain seat.it is attested in the archive from 27 March 1997, when it showed only a welcome page with no other content.
seat.it, from the 1997 welcome page to Italiaonline
The domain seat.it is recorded by the web archive from 27 March 1997, when it appears with the wording "Welcome to the SEAT site". The most recent recordings with content, from March 2019 and 1 January 2020, show the site under the name "Seat - Italiaonline", after the brand merged into the Italiaonline group.
The domain seat.it and the merger with Italiaonline
The site seat.it recounts its own corporate transformation: according to the text published on the home page and recorded by the web archive on 14 March 2019, on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquires 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rises to 80.23% on 6 November 2015 at the end of the tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle takes legal effect, and in the process it changes its own name to Italiaonline S.p.A. The same text still appears, unchanged, in the recording of 1 January 2020.
The domain seat.it, from the merger with Italiaonline to the change of name (2015-2016)
The domain seat.it tracks the corporate affairs of the holding company: the recording of 27 March 1997 shows only a welcome page. The recordings of 14 March 2019 and 1 January 2020 instead carry the same text, which recounts the share transfer: on 9 September 2015 Italiaonline S.p.A. acquires 54.34% of Seat Pagine Gialle S.p.A., a stake that rose to 80.23% as of 6 November 2015 at the end of the tender offer; on 20 June 2016 the reverse merger of Italiaonline into Seat Pagine Gialle becomes effective, and in the transaction it itself takes the name Italiaonline S.p.A., redirecting visitors to the site www.italiaonline.it.
The domain seat.it
The domain seat.it has been online since 27 March 1997 as SEAT's site; from 2019 the heading becomes "Seat - Italiaonline", reflecting the brand's merger into the Italiaonline group. The last snapshot preserved by the archive in this guise is from 1 January 2020.
Sources
- whois.nic.it
- web.archive.org — 27 March 1997
- web.archive.org — 22 December 2018
- web.archive.org — 19 March 2025
- La Stampa — 26 January 1979
- La Stampa — 4 March 1987
- La Stampa — 9 September 1998
- Web Archive (seat.it) — 14 March 2019
- Web Archive (seat.it) — 1 January 2020
- Web Archive (seat.it) — 27 March 1997
- Internet Archive - Wayback Machine — 14 March 2019
- Internet Archive - Wayback Machine — 1 January 2020