The second times a charm for Dice Holdings (NYSE:DHX) who went public again yesterday after emerging from its 2004 bankruptcy. The website operator raised $217 million after it priced at $13/share - the top of its expected range. The IPO was especially rewarding for the company's two private equity backers, General Atlantic and Quatrangle Group, who stand to make roughly 2.7x their money in two years. Meanwhile, some investors remain skeptical as to the long-term viability of the company.

Dice Holdings initially went public back in 1998 at the peak of the dot-com boom only to end up in bankruptcy courts five years later. Since then the company has improved substantially with $83.7 million in revenues in 2006 compared to $32.2 million in 2004. The company plans to use the proceeds from its second more successful IPO to pay off more than $190 million in debt and fund general business expenses.

The real story, however, is in the private equity funds that successfully executed a bankruptcy play. The two funds formed Dice Holdings in August of 2005 and bought the company for pennies on the dollar - $138.6 million. Amazingly, they recouped most of this cost in a $107.9 million dividend payout in March. This means they are still holding shares at an adjusted purchase price of just over $18 million, putting their cost per share at around 40 cents! Perhaps this is something to consider the next time a private equity fund makes a bid for one of your stocks that seems to be underperforming in the short-term...

In the end, the long-term viability of Dice remains uncertain as their primary business is in their employment portal, Dice.com. Ideally, the company will be able to use these proceeds to pay off its debts and build itself into a cash cow that may be attractive to other larger employment portals like Monster.com (NDAQ:MNST) or even some technology-related newspapers. Combined, these factors make DHX a stock worth watching!