Tag Archives: Reid Hoffman
Google, Twitter, Yahoo!, and Other Tech Company Execs Sign Petition Against SOPA
Stop Online Piracy Act is a bill that was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives in October 2011 by Lamar Smith (R-TX). This Act would allow the Department of Justice and copyright holders to seek court orders against websites accused of copyright infringement that would prevent online ad networks and payment facilitators from doing business with those websites. Opponents in this bill believe that this is Internet censorship. Google co-founder Sergey Brin, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, PayPal co-founder Elon Musk, and Yahoo! co-founder Jerry Yang oppose the bill. Their letter will appear as a paid ad in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other newspapers.
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Edmodo Raises $15 Million In Series B
Edmodo is an education social network for teachers and students K-12. The company has raised $15 million in Series B funding led by Greylock Partners and Benchmark Capital. Reid Hoffman (Greylock) and Matt Cohler (Benchmark) will be joining Edmodo’s board of directors as a result of this funding round.
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Categories Benchmark Capital, Edmodo, Greylock Partners, Matt Cohler, Reid Hoffman
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It Took LinkedIn Five Years To Turn Its First Profit
LinkedIn Corporation (NYSE:LNKD) founder Reid Hoffman was thoroughly profiled by The New York Times this weekend. The story really gave you an inside behind how LinkedIn grew from a small social network that nobody heard about to a public company minting hundreds of millions of dollars. As a venture capital partner at Greylock, Reid Hoffman is also a go-to guy for business advice in Silicon Valley.
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Categories LinkedIn, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman
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Rumor: Ning Being Shopped Around For $150 Million
Ning has recently been shopping around themselves for roughly $150 million according to sources with AllThingsD. Ning, co-founded by Marc Andreessen, gave a pitch to Google, Groupon, and several private equity companies.
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One Kings Lane Raises $23 Million
One Kings Lane is a website that was co-founded by Alison Pincus, the wife of Zynga CEO Mark Pincus. One Kings Lane raised a $23 million second round of funding led by Greylock Partners with participation from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Kleiner Perkins is a previous investors and so is Greylock partner Reid Hoffman. Reid Hoffman, TriplePoint Capital, and Marissa Mayer also participated in this round of funding. One Kings Lane sales were up 500% over 2009 and over 75% came from repeat customers. One Kings Lane is very similar to Groupon as it is a daily deals website. [TechCrunch]
LinkedIn Files To Go Public, Acquires CardMunch
Professional social network LinkedIn.com has filed to go public. LinkedIn is currently hitting about $200 million in anunal revenues. This is up 200% from about a year ago. With a 10x valuation, LinkedIn is expected to have a $2 billion market cap. This means that founder Reid Hoffman’s 21.4% stake would be worth around $430 million. LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner would be worth $80 million. Sequoia Capital’s $4.7 million investment in the company would be worth $380 million. LinkedIn also recently acquired CardMunch, a business card reading application for the iPhone.
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Categories CardMunch, Jeff Weiner, LinkedIn, Reid Hoffman, Sequoia Capital
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Facebook Co-Founder Eduardo Saverin and Other High-Profile Investors Send $8 Million To Qwiki
Qwiki has raised $8 million in series A funding. The largest investor in this round is Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin. Saverin has been very low-key with his investments due to the tumultuous experience he had as a Facebook co-founder. Essentially Mark Zuckerberg reduced Saverin’s equity to 0.03%, but gave him proper equity back when Saverin started talking to the press about his side of the story. His side of the story was made into a movie called The Social Network.
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Facebook Acquires Technology Platform Company Chai Labs
Facebook has acquired Chai Labs, a technology platform company where publishers can easily create search-friendly websites. Chai Labs customers include NBC Local, Associated Content, and Travel Ad Network. The acquisition price is rumored to be about $10 million.
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Categories Chai Labs, Facebook, Gokul Rajaram, Joe Kraus, Marc Andreessen, Reid Hoffman
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Happy 7th Birthday LinkedIn!
LinkedIn, the professional social network created by Reid Hoffman has turned 7 years old according to Senior Director of Corporate Communications Kay Luo. LinkedIn was founded in December 2002, but actually launched on May 5, 2003. LinkedIn has about 65 million registered users and it could be worth over $1 billion according to several estimates.
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Categories Kay Luo, LinkedIn, Reid Hoffman
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Gowalla Raises $8.4 Million From Greylock and Several Angel Investors
Gowalla is a location based social networking website that has raised $8.4 million in funding. Greylock Partners was the lead investor and the company plans to use the funding to strengthen their development capabilities. Thus far Gowalla has raised over $10 million since they started in 2007.
“Gowalla has rapidly attracted a passionate user base by creating an innovative, useful service that is also a lot of fun,” stated Greylock’s David Thacker. “It’s exciting to discover new places and earn stamps for your passport from places as diverse as Buckingham Palace and the Sydney Opera House to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the coffee shop down the street. Gowalla also connects you with your friends, letting you share your travels and meet up with others in real time.” Thacker has joined the Gowalla Board of Directors as part of the investment.
LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman also joined Gowalla’s board of directors as an observer.
Other investors in Gowalla include Jason Calacanis, Kevin Rose, Maples Investments, Shasta Ventures, Ron Conway, Gary Vaynerchuk, Shervin Pishevar, and Chris Sacca. Previous investors Alsop-Louie Partners and Founders Fund also participated in this round.