Pulse2 Technology and Social Media News » Multiply.com

Naspers Acquires Controlling Stake In Multiply.com

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 05:15:32 +0000

Naspers Limited, a multinational media company based in Cape Town, South Africa has acquired a controlling interest in Multiply.com. The acquisition was made through the Myriad International Holdings unit of Naspers. Multiply.com will continue to operate under the same management team after the acquisition.

Multiply.com was founded in 2004 and raised $26.6 million in venture capital ever since. In Multiply’s latest funding round November 2008, Multiply.com was valued at $100 million.

Back in October 2008, Microsoft Corporation handed off MSN Groups to Multiply.com. Multiply.com is more than just a social network now. The company also encourages media sharing. Multiply.com claims 70,000 merchants and 20 million monthly unique visitors as of right now.
Earlier this year, Multiply Marketplace was launched as a way for sellers to launch e-commerce stores.

[TechCrunch]

Multiply Raises $5 Million From ABS-CBN; Now Valuated At $100 Million

Amit Chowdhry — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 17:51:12 +0000

Multiply.com is a social network that offers similar services as Facebook. The difference is that Multiply allows users to upload higher quality videos and photos into a digital scrapbook for a premium price. Multiply has a large number of adult users as well.

Recently Multiply raised $5 million in funding from ABS-CBN, a Philippines-based media company. The $5 million gave ABS-CBN a 5% stake (2.5 million shares). ABS-CBN was also given the option to invest another $4 million in the next 3 years to attain a 10% stake.

To date, Multiply has raised $27.6 million in funding from VantagePoint Venture Partners, Point Judith Capital, and Trans Cosmos. With this round of funding, TechCrunch pegs Multiply’s valuation to be around $100 million. Multiply is based in Boca Raton, FL and has offices in San Francisco, CA and NYC.

Multiply “Digital Scrapbooks” Now At Premium Price Of $19.95/Year

Amit Chowdhry — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 15:29:00 +0000

Multiply is a social network where users can upload videos, photos, blog, etc.Â Multiply now offers premium services, but is charging $19.95 per year for the extra “digital scrapbook” features.Â The premium feature allows users to upload unlimited high-resolution pictures and videos that go up to 20 minutes in length.

“This is the logical extension to our users, whose social networking revolves around an inclusive discussion and shared memories with their close friends and families, rather than a broadcast of transitory bits and pieces to the world,” stated Peter Pezaris, CEO of Multiply, Inc. “With Multiply Premium, our users can ensure that all their digital media and their memories are available, forever.”

The Numbers
The uploaded media will only be viewable to a user’s personal network and direct contacts if desired.Â Multiply has over 9 million users.Â And over 2 million photos are uploaded daily on the site across all of these users.Â About 19,000 videos and 55,000 blog posts are added posted daily as well.

Multiply uses an AutoUploader tool to make adding photos seamless.Â Photos can also be imported from Windows Live Spaces, Shutterfly, Kodak EasyShare Gallery, Flickr, Photobucket, or from any other web page.

Multiply is based in Boca Raton, FL and has offices in San Francisco, CA and NYC, NY.Â The company blog is available at: http://multiply.multiply.com/.

Multiply was founded by Peter Pezaris and has over $21 million in total funding.Â Investors in Multiply include Trans Cosmos, Point Judith Capital, VantagePoint Venture Partners.

Multiply.com Adds $16.6 Million To Its Funding Sum

Amit Chowdhry — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 05:57:38 +0000

Multiply.com is a social network that claims that it has 6 million members. The site also claims that 1.25 million and thirteen thousand videos are added per day. Hence the name, Multiply. The number of members isn’t the only variable that has been multiplied on Multiply, but so did the amount of funding that it has received recently. VantagePoint Venture Partners, Point Judith Capital, and Transcosmos Investments have invested $16.6 million into the company as announced on VentureBeat today.

Multiply gained some traction when they first started in 2003, but has been overshadowed by other social network websites like Facebook, Friendster, and MySpace. Yet Multiply was able to retain a vast number of unique visitors: 10 million unique this past August (2 million in the U.S.) and is growing at 10% per month.

The key ingredient of Multiply’s user retention is its message boards. The message boards keeps users updated about when friends update blogs, distribute photos and videos, and other information. This is similar to Facebook’s news feeds. Multiply’s average age is around 35.

Last month, Multiply launched an iPhone version of its platform. All of Multiply.com’s management team members were previously working Daedalus World Wide Corporation. The company was founded by Peter Pezaris. Multiply.com also announced plans to make a toolbar.

I believe that the company raised a total of $22.6 million in funding since its Series A. I read about the company’s Series A on Mashable.