Steve Case Invests In Revitalized Vinfolio As It Expands In $3 Billion Fine Wine Market

Revolution LLC investment helps fuel expansion of Vinfolio’s wine marketplace, enabling unsurpassed convenience and efficiency for fine wine buyers and sellers

SAN FRANCISCO, May 25 /PRNewswire/ — Vinfolio, a leading source for fine wine that serves the needs of fine wine enthusiasts and collectors worldwide (www.vinfolio.com), today announced it has received funding from Revolution LLC, the investment company created by AOL co-founder Steve Case to invest in companies that are driving transformative change by shifting power to consumers. Terms were not disclosed.

Vinfolio provides fine wine enthusiasts and collectors with cutting edge technology to purchase and manage wine collections with ease and share their ratings and opinions with others. Most specifically, Vinfolio’s Marketplace offers consumers an innovative new channel to buy and sell hard-to-find wines, creating greater access and transparency in the currently fragmented collectible market.

“Revolution’s investment enables Vinfolio to fuel its growth by providing substantial financial resources as well as invaluable expertise in customer driven e-commerce initiatives,” said Vinfolio CEO Michael Jellison. “The Revolution team will help us build on the lessons from the world’s most popular recommendation engines, auction marketplaces and social media platforms, as Vinfolio seeks to simplify a fragmented, confusing market and make fine wine purchasing and exchange easier for everyone.”

New Board for Revitalized Vinfolio

To further strengthen and expand the newly-constituted Vinfolio Board of Directors, Revolution’s David Golden and Philippe Bourguignon will join current Board members N. Colin Lind, Jon Moramarco and Jean-Michel Valette.

Mr. Golden, who prior to Revolution spent 18 years at JP Morgan, focuses on finance and transactions for Revolution and its various businesses. Mr. Bourguignon is currently CEO of Miraval Arizona, Revolution’s world-class resort spa in Tucson, Ariz., and was formerly Chairman and CEO of ClubMed, Chairman and CEO of Euro Disney, co-CEO of the Davos-based World Economic Forum, and a Board member of eBay.

Mr. Lind has more than 30 years of hands-on investing experience, including Board roles. For the past 25 years he has been a principal at Blum Capital Partners. L.P., where he is currently Managing Partner of the investment firm which holds $3 billion in assets. Mr. Moramarco has been an executive in the wine business for over 20 years with extensive experience in both the domestic and international wine worlds. Mr. Valette is an independent advisor to branded consumer companies and is currently Chairman of Peet’s Coffee & Tea, Inc. and Select Comfort Corporation. He was previously Chairman of Robert Mondavi Winery and is one of 27 Americans to hold the title of Master of Wine.

“As an eBay board member for the past decade, I experienced firsthand the power of using the Internet to build bridges between buyers and sellers,” said Bourguignon. “Vinfolio’s potential to simplify the market for consumers and become the go-to marketplace for fine wine buyers and sellers is significant. We look forward to working closely with them as they capitalize on the opportunities.”

Vinfolio’s Leading Services

Vinfolio’s selection of unique and rare wines and superior customer service are cornerstones of its business. The company also offers a host of products and services that enable fine wine buyers, sellers and collectors to connect and transact, such as:

* Vinfolio Marketplace: Creates more consumer confidence by providing an efficient and transparent channel for buying and selling fine wine.
* Vinfolio Priority Program: Rewards customer loyalty with advance access to highly prized wines and free or discounted services.
* Wine buying tools: Provides customers with a suite of robust wine buying tools to customize their shopping experience.
* Extensive product content: Promotes informed wine buying decisions by providing consumers with professional scores, producer information, auction data, wine tasting videos and more.
* VinCellar: Streamlines management of a wine collection by offering a free cellar management application to input and share tasting notes, valuate a collection and more.
* Storage and transport: Provides secure temperature controlled wine storage and local free delivery in the SF Bay Area, as well as free insurance on all shipments and deliveries.
* Multiple selling options: Provides individuals with the option of selling wines via the Vinfolio Marketplace or Fixed-price Auctions.

About Vinfolio – www.vinfolio.com

Vinfolio is a leading source for fine wine, serving the needs of wine enthusiasts and collectors worldwide. Through its online wine store and Marketplace, the company offers access to thousands of unique wines. Vinfolio’s mission is to bring simplicity and transparency to the buying and selling of fine wine and provide exceptional service to its wine buying, selling and storage customers. Launched in March 2010, Vinfolio is a new company that was formed from the purchase of the assets of Vinfolio, Inc. by VF Wine, Inc. The company is headquartered in San Francisco.

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The company previously raised $50 million Series B in September 2007. Thus far Revolution Money raised $92 million.

The idea behind Revolution Money is to lower credit card charges and other payment transfers. Merchants are charged an 0.5% transaction fee.

“It’s a vote of confidence from the insiders and we were able to bring in this affiliate of Goldman [a new investor],” stated Leonsis. “It’s such a big opportunity and big play. There hasn’t been a new entrant since PayPal, which was about a dozen years ago.”

Revolution Money’s two products are called RevolutionCard and RevolutionMoneyExchange. RevolutionCard is a credit card that charges the 0.5% per transaction which is compared to the 1.5% to 4% fee normally charged to traditional companies.

Revolution MoneyExchange is a P2P payment system that allows users to exchange money for free. MoneyExchange has about 400,000 registered users since the service started.

[via WSJ]