Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Sunday, July 8, 2012
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Articles on Bloom Energy a must read!!!!!
http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2009/10/19/story7.html?b=1255924800%5e2279931
http://www.greentechmedia.com/green-light/post/kps-john-doerr-greentech-the-largest-economic-opportunity-of-the-21st-cen/
http://www.freshdialogues.com/2009/11/04/kr-sridhar-bloom-energy-timeline-and-team/
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/jun/15/fuel-cell-maker-didnt-choose-site-by-accident/
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/may/28/fuel-cell-technology-to-be-developed-in-east/
PRESS RELEASES
http://c0688662.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-Girish-Paranjpe-5-26-2011.pdf
http://c0688662.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-CA-expansion-4-15-2011.pdf
https://www.venturegateway.com/My/NewsDocs/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-electrons-customers-1-20-2011.pdf
https://www.venturegateway.com/My/NewsDocs/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-electrons-1-20-2011%20v2.pdf
http://www.greentechmedia.com/green-light/post/kps-john-doerr-greentech-the-largest-economic-opportunity-of-the-21st-cen/
http://www.freshdialogues.com/2009/11/04/kr-sridhar-bloom-energy-timeline-and-team/
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/jun/15/fuel-cell-maker-didnt-choose-site-by-accident/
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/may/28/fuel-cell-technology-to-be-developed-in-east/
PRESS RELEASES
http://c0688662.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-Girish-Paranjpe-5-26-2011.pdf
http://c0688662.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-CA-expansion-4-15-2011.pdf
https://www.venturegateway.com/My/NewsDocs/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-electrons-customers-1-20-2011.pdf
https://www.venturegateway.com/My/NewsDocs/downloads-pdf-release-bloom-electrons-1-20-2011%20v2.pdf
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Going Public, Facebook Will Make Mark Zuckerberg at Least $21 Billion
At the very least, Zuckerberg will instantly become one of the 10 wealthiest Americans, and if the first day of trading goes his way, he could become the fourth-richest man in the country.
Monetizr on Facebook
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Now you can monetizr your facebook, it's Pre-launching now...
Monetizr allows you to monetize your Facebook account
without doing anything more than you do normally on Facebook.
How to make Money?
#1. Monetizr will display ads on your wall and you get paid
#2. Earn 15% from your facebook friends earnings.
Make money - it's fast and easy with Monetizr!
Go Register HERE, it's FREE
http://tinyurl.com/72flqba
Or visit my facebook page: www.facebook.com/ASMGlobalVentures
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Investing in Secondary Markets
As Facebook (FB) joins the roughly 5,100 public companies trading on major exchanges in the United States, only a week ago shares were swapping hands on a completely different market… the secondary market.
And, for a growing number of investors and institutions, this alternative marketplace is quickly becoming a hot spot to potentially cash in on a number of firms before they go public.
In fact, you might even be eligible to participate… and not even know it.
The Truth About Secondary Markets
According to aonetwork.com, secondary market exchanges serve to facilitate the purchase and sale of illiquid, restricted and alternative assets, such as private company stock and restricted public equity.
Facebook, Zynga (Nasdaq: ZNGA) and LinkedIn (NYSE: LNKD) all sold on secondary market exchanges before they filed to go public.
Today, well-known firms such as Twitter, Bloom Energy, e-Harmony and Foursquare can all be found on these exchanges, as well.
And many other companies, tech start-ups especially, are finding secondary markets as nice alternatives to IPOs.
LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner explains, “Historically when companies had established a certain level of performance and maturity, the IPO was a natural next step. The reason for that was to generate liquidity… to get access to currency… capital… and [for] credibility. The secondary market can help check the box for a few of those objectives.”
So, could secondary markets ever replace the IPO?
Not a chance. Private companies aren’t required to disclose their financial information to investors like publicly traded firms. That’s one of the major risks in this market.
But as Reuters points out, “While the amount of information that would-be investors have is surely lower than if there were a formal SEC-registered prospectus, the rise of the internet has made it much easier to do reasonably good due diligence on how much a company might be worth.”
That’s a big reason the amount of capital flowing in the private-share trading business has more than doubled in value, to $7 billion, in just the past two years.
Even more, Congress is looking to pass laws that could push even more liquidity to this market by doubling the amount of shareholders, to 1,000, that private companies are allowed before needing to publicly disclose their finances.
This is very promising news for companies, like SecondMarket and SharesPost, involved in the secondary market.
Introducing SecondMarket and SharesPost
Founded in 2004, SecondMarket offers a number of asset-backed investments – including auction-rate securities, bankruptcy claims, private company stocks and fixed income products. Meanwhile, SharesPost specializes only in the selling of private company stock.
All of the companies mentioned above (Twitter, Bloom Energy, etc.) either trade on SharesPost, SecondMarket, or both. These two companies currently dominate the secondary market space.
The main purpose of these firms is to connect buyers and sellers to trade the various assets they offer. In a way, they are sort of like e-Harmony or LinkedIn, but for investors and institutions.
For example, SecondMarket uses a proprietary matching algorithm to search through its 75,000-customer base and find good matches between buyers with sellers. After a trade is complete, the companies then take a cut of the total transaction, roughly 3%. This business model has made SecondMarket worth about $200 million, according to The Wall Street Journal.
And now a slew of new competitors are catching on…
For example, Crain’s New York Business reports financial services firm Knight Capital Group (NYSE: KCG) just established its own private-share trading business in December. And LiquidNet, an institutional brokerage firm, also entered this space last year.
As I eluded earlier, not all investors are eligible to enter this market. It’s only open to financial institutions and accredited investors. In other words, you need to be a hedge fund, investment bank, or have a net worth of $1 million and an annual income of $200,000, or a joint income of $300,000 with your spouse, to start investing.
Plus, it’s worth mentioning many of these firms have minimum transaction requirements. For instance, SecondMarket has a minimum transaction amount of $100,000. So you need to have a good amount of cash to get involved.
The Bottom Line
Of course, before entering any investment, it’s important to do your homework first and know what you’re getting into. The secondary markets are certainly not for everyone, but it is a very interesting development and is helping reshape the way companies prepare for their IPO.
Disclosure: Investment U expressly forbids its writers from having a financial interest in any security they recommend to our subscribers. All employees and agents of Investment U (and affiliated companies) must wait 24 hours after an initial trade recommendation is published on online - or 72 hours after a direct mail publication is sent - before acting on that recommendation.
And, for a growing number of investors and institutions, this alternative marketplace is quickly becoming a hot spot to potentially cash in on a number of firms before they go public.
In fact, you might even be eligible to participate… and not even know it.
The Truth About Secondary Markets
According to aonetwork.com, secondary market exchanges serve to facilitate the purchase and sale of illiquid, restricted and alternative assets, such as private company stock and restricted public equity.
Facebook, Zynga (Nasdaq: ZNGA) and LinkedIn (NYSE: LNKD) all sold on secondary market exchanges before they filed to go public.
Today, well-known firms such as Twitter, Bloom Energy, e-Harmony and Foursquare can all be found on these exchanges, as well.
And many other companies, tech start-ups especially, are finding secondary markets as nice alternatives to IPOs.
LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner explains, “Historically when companies had established a certain level of performance and maturity, the IPO was a natural next step. The reason for that was to generate liquidity… to get access to currency… capital… and [for] credibility. The secondary market can help check the box for a few of those objectives.”
So, could secondary markets ever replace the IPO?
Not a chance. Private companies aren’t required to disclose their financial information to investors like publicly traded firms. That’s one of the major risks in this market.
But as Reuters points out, “While the amount of information that would-be investors have is surely lower than if there were a formal SEC-registered prospectus, the rise of the internet has made it much easier to do reasonably good due diligence on how much a company might be worth.”
That’s a big reason the amount of capital flowing in the private-share trading business has more than doubled in value, to $7 billion, in just the past two years.
Even more, Congress is looking to pass laws that could push even more liquidity to this market by doubling the amount of shareholders, to 1,000, that private companies are allowed before needing to publicly disclose their finances.
This is very promising news for companies, like SecondMarket and SharesPost, involved in the secondary market.
Introducing SecondMarket and SharesPost
Founded in 2004, SecondMarket offers a number of asset-backed investments – including auction-rate securities, bankruptcy claims, private company stocks and fixed income products. Meanwhile, SharesPost specializes only in the selling of private company stock.
All of the companies mentioned above (Twitter, Bloom Energy, etc.) either trade on SharesPost, SecondMarket, or both. These two companies currently dominate the secondary market space.
The main purpose of these firms is to connect buyers and sellers to trade the various assets they offer. In a way, they are sort of like e-Harmony or LinkedIn, but for investors and institutions.
For example, SecondMarket uses a proprietary matching algorithm to search through its 75,000-customer base and find good matches between buyers with sellers. After a trade is complete, the companies then take a cut of the total transaction, roughly 3%. This business model has made SecondMarket worth about $200 million, according to The Wall Street Journal.
And now a slew of new competitors are catching on…
For example, Crain’s New York Business reports financial services firm Knight Capital Group (NYSE: KCG) just established its own private-share trading business in December. And LiquidNet, an institutional brokerage firm, also entered this space last year.
As I eluded earlier, not all investors are eligible to enter this market. It’s only open to financial institutions and accredited investors. In other words, you need to be a hedge fund, investment bank, or have a net worth of $1 million and an annual income of $200,000, or a joint income of $300,000 with your spouse, to start investing.
Plus, it’s worth mentioning many of these firms have minimum transaction requirements. For instance, SecondMarket has a minimum transaction amount of $100,000. So you need to have a good amount of cash to get involved.
The Bottom Line
Of course, before entering any investment, it’s important to do your homework first and know what you’re getting into. The secondary markets are certainly not for everyone, but it is a very interesting development and is helping reshape the way companies prepare for their IPO.
Disclosure: Investment U expressly forbids its writers from having a financial interest in any security they recommend to our subscribers. All employees and agents of Investment U (and affiliated companies) must wait 24 hours after an initial trade recommendation is published on online - or 72 hours after a direct mail publication is sent - before acting on that recommendation.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Buy Facebook with both hands
The long awaited Facebook IPO is near. Morgan Stanley (MS) will lead the syndicate. Goldman Sachs (GS) did not get the lead role even though it has an investment in Facebook, but it is anticipated to have a major role.
It's a no brainer to buy with both hands as many shares of Facebook as you can get in the IPO. The probability is very high that in the days and months following the IPO investors will have opportunities to sell their shares at a nice profit. For the long-term, price earnings ratios, growth rates, etc. matter, but, it is all about supply and demand in the short-term. Investors inclined to hold for the longer-term will have plenty of opportunity to see how the stock is trading and how the fundamentals are shaping up to make a reasonable decision, to hold the stock or take profits.
In the coming days, there will be much analysis of revenues, profits, gross margins, cash flow, growth rates, etc. Certainly, such analysis will be of interest to talking heads, journalist, and academicians. Media will love the story as it will generate more viewers or readers.
The reality is that underwriters will price the IPO based on demand under the ruse of comparisons with recent internet IPOs such as Zynga (ZNGA), LinkedIn (LNKD), Pandora (P), Renren (RENN), Sina (SINA), and Groupon (GRPN).
Underwriters will justify the extremely high price of the stock based on potential growth.
Facebook is the new standard platform of communications for 800 million members. Exact numbers will not be known until the IPO is filed. Several informed sources have reported that between 2009 and 2011, Facebook's revenues grew at about 125% annual rate to $3.8 billion in 2011 with operating profit of $1.5 billion.
comScore reports that Facebook served 28% of all display ads. Brand advertisers like the narrow targeting they can achieve on Facebook.
For an investor who wants to generate profits, from a practical point of view, doing the foregoing analysis is an unnecessary torture of brain cells. None of the traditional fundamental analysis is going to make a difference.
Our qualitative estimate of the demand is around one billion shares compared to the supply of about 250 million shares. The point is that the demand is likely to be 400% of the supply.
An astute investor will buy with both hands all of the shares he or she can get in the IPO.
It's a no brainer to buy with both hands as many shares of Facebook as you can get in the IPO. The probability is very high that in the days and months following the IPO investors will have opportunities to sell their shares at a nice profit. For the long-term, price earnings ratios, growth rates, etc. matter, but, it is all about supply and demand in the short-term. Investors inclined to hold for the longer-term will have plenty of opportunity to see how the stock is trading and how the fundamentals are shaping up to make a reasonable decision, to hold the stock or take profits.
In the coming days, there will be much analysis of revenues, profits, gross margins, cash flow, growth rates, etc. Certainly, such analysis will be of interest to talking heads, journalist, and academicians. Media will love the story as it will generate more viewers or readers.
The reality is that underwriters will price the IPO based on demand under the ruse of comparisons with recent internet IPOs such as Zynga (ZNGA), LinkedIn (LNKD), Pandora (P), Renren (RENN), Sina (SINA), and Groupon (GRPN).
Underwriters will justify the extremely high price of the stock based on potential growth.
Facebook is the new standard platform of communications for 800 million members. Exact numbers will not be known until the IPO is filed. Several informed sources have reported that between 2009 and 2011, Facebook's revenues grew at about 125% annual rate to $3.8 billion in 2011 with operating profit of $1.5 billion.
comScore reports that Facebook served 28% of all display ads. Brand advertisers like the narrow targeting they can achieve on Facebook.
For an investor who wants to generate profits, from a practical point of view, doing the foregoing analysis is an unnecessary torture of brain cells. None of the traditional fundamental analysis is going to make a difference.
Our qualitative estimate of the demand is around one billion shares compared to the supply of about 250 million shares. The point is that the demand is likely to be 400% of the supply.
An astute investor will buy with both hands all of the shares he or she can get in the IPO.
Monday, January 30, 2012
Wall Street clicks 'like' on Facebook IPO
Wall Street clicks 'like' on Facebook IPO
The social networking giant with nearly 1 billion users is expected to file papers any day now to sell stock to the public. The timing stems partly from federal rules that would require Facebook to begin disclosing its financial information in April because of its phenomenal growth.
Beyond minting an estimated 1,000 new millionaires at the company, Facebook's initial public stock offering could provide a huge boost to Wall Street investment banks sorely in need of a hot stock to excite investors. The right to manage the IPO will also generate an estimated $250 million in fees.
"This will be the largest IPO of the year for sure and probably of the decade," said Max Wolff, senior analyst at GreenCrest Capital Management in New York. "There is literally a fortune in fees, which is occurring in a slow market. There's also bragging rights. These firms want to be able to go to their clients and offer them an allocation of the Facebook IPO."
Facebook is expected to raise $10 billion in the offering, giving it a market capitalization of $100 billion. Google, by comparison, raised $1.9 billion in its IPO in 2004.
Shares of Google skyrocketed on their opening day, and analysts expect Facebook shares to do the same.
"The minute the IPO is filed, there will be pandemonium," said IPO Boutique's Scott Sweet, who says he has never seen anything quite like the pent-up demand for Facebook shares. "And this is coming from someone who has seen extremely hot IPOs. I have seen pandemonium."
A successful IPO by one of the country's most prominent companies also could power the stock market higher by attracting scores of investors who have been scared off by the volatility in recent years.
"People are looking for something that's going to give them confidence," said David Menlow, president of IPOfinancial.com, a research firm in Millburn, N.J. "They'd like to believe the IPO is going to be a strong one."
State officials are also counting on the IPO to help with California's budget crisis. Recent technology IPOs have added hundreds of millions of dollars to state coffers from capital gains taxes.
Facebook has become one of the world's best-known consumer brands and the Web's most popular hangout. And sometime this year it's expected to hit 1 billion users. That's half of all people on the Internet and 1 in 7 people on the planet.
Mark Zuckerberg founded the company in his Harvard dorm room at age 19. Now 27, Zuckerberg's stake in Facebook will be worth an estimated $20 billion after the IPO — making him one of the world's richest men.
The company's success lies in the hoard of information it holds about its users — valuable information that advertisers can use to target their products and services. Its growing business has escalated competition with rival tech giants Google andApple Inc.
Now Facebook is looking to build a war chest from the IPO to dominate the Web for decades. Can Facebook stake its fortune in social networking in the wildly profitable way Google did with Internet search?
Swarms of investors can't wait to find out. Even everyday users are looking forward to poring over Facebook's prospectus — the first in-depth glimpse at Facebook's financials — as if it were the next installment of "Twilight" or "Harry Potter."
How much money the company is making is a closely guarded secret. But that will soon change.
Within days or weeks, Facebook is expected to file papers with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announcing its intent to sell stock. As part of the filing, Facebook will release a prospectus with detailed financial information, including its revenue and income.
The actual sale of stock typically occurs about three months after the initial filing.
In fevered anticipation of the IPO, shares have surged on private trading exchanges. This week, Sharespost sold a block of 70,000 shares at $34 a share. At that price, Facebook is already valued at more than $80 billion.
Facebook's expected public offering could mean pandemonium for investors and big fees for brokerages.
Some are hanging back. Just because you use Facebook doesn't mean you should own it, at least not right away, especially given the lackluster debuts of high-profile Internet companies Groupon and Zynga.
Wall Street clicks 'like' on Facebook IPO
"Expectations are so high, and there have been so many rounds of investment on private exchanges, one has to wonder how much upside is left once Facebook becomes a public company," said Anthony Valencia, media analyst at TCW Group.
Those expectations couldn't be any higher than on Facebook's splashy new Menlo Park campus 30 miles south of San Francisco on the edge of tidal mud flats and salt marshes. Every square foot of the 57-acre campus still under construction speaks to the ascendance of Facebook. Hacker Way is now the premier vanity address in Silicon Valley.
Facebook will soon pour asphalt for a main drag that cuts a broad swath through the middle of campus. By March, thousands of staffers will stroll on sidewalks or roll on bicycles and Ripstiks (two-wheeled skateboards) down the middle of a colorful urban scape lined with awning-shaded storefronts such as a noodle joint, a bike shop, Philz Coffee stand, a dry cleaners, computer help desk and a burger shack that some have dubbed Zuckerberger's even before it opens for business.
The wealth of some of the campus' new residents is already apparent in the parking lot, where a black Tesla was juicing up at an electric vehicle charging station. Facebook has purchased land across a busy highway that would give Facebook enough room to grow to more than 9,000 employees. There are already plans afoot to equip a large highway undercrossing with a giant people mover.
It's a grown-up campus for a company that is now all grown up. Friends say Zuckerberg, who declined requests for an interview, has now embraced an IPO as a natural next step for his company and a reward for its employees. But the guy who turned down a billion-dollar offer from Yahoo when he was just 22 is unlikely to change his independent stripe even after ringing the opening bell, said David Kirkpatrick, author of "The Facebook Effect."
Being publicly traded will bring heavier scrutiny from regulators alarmed at how Facebook handles users' data despite a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission in which the company agreed to privacy audits for 20 years. And Wall Street will exert pressure to woo the big campaigns from Madison Avenue advertisers that Facebook will need to pump up revenue to meet ever-rising expectations. In 2011, Facebook is believed to have raked in $4.2 billion, about what Apple generates in three weeks.
Zuckerberg probably will borrow a page from Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who famously warned investors they planned to run their Internet company unconventionally. Facebook's dual-class stock structure also ensures that Zuckerberg will retain firm control over the company and its board of directors.
Read more here http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-facebook-20120127,0,6352193.story?page=1
The social networking giant with nearly 1 billion users is expected to file papers any day now to sell stock to the public. The timing stems partly from federal rules that would require Facebook to begin disclosing its financial information in April because of its phenomenal growth.
Beyond minting an estimated 1,000 new millionaires at the company, Facebook's initial public stock offering could provide a huge boost to Wall Street investment banks sorely in need of a hot stock to excite investors. The right to manage the IPO will also generate an estimated $250 million in fees.
"This will be the largest IPO of the year for sure and probably of the decade," said Max Wolff, senior analyst at GreenCrest Capital Management in New York. "There is literally a fortune in fees, which is occurring in a slow market. There's also bragging rights. These firms want to be able to go to their clients and offer them an allocation of the Facebook IPO."
Facebook is expected to raise $10 billion in the offering, giving it a market capitalization of $100 billion. Google, by comparison, raised $1.9 billion in its IPO in 2004.
Shares of Google skyrocketed on their opening day, and analysts expect Facebook shares to do the same.
"The minute the IPO is filed, there will be pandemonium," said IPO Boutique's Scott Sweet, who says he has never seen anything quite like the pent-up demand for Facebook shares. "And this is coming from someone who has seen extremely hot IPOs. I have seen pandemonium."
A successful IPO by one of the country's most prominent companies also could power the stock market higher by attracting scores of investors who have been scared off by the volatility in recent years.
"People are looking for something that's going to give them confidence," said David Menlow, president of IPOfinancial.com, a research firm in Millburn, N.J. "They'd like to believe the IPO is going to be a strong one."
State officials are also counting on the IPO to help with California's budget crisis. Recent technology IPOs have added hundreds of millions of dollars to state coffers from capital gains taxes.
Facebook has become one of the world's best-known consumer brands and the Web's most popular hangout. And sometime this year it's expected to hit 1 billion users. That's half of all people on the Internet and 1 in 7 people on the planet.
Mark Zuckerberg founded the company in his Harvard dorm room at age 19. Now 27, Zuckerberg's stake in Facebook will be worth an estimated $20 billion after the IPO — making him one of the world's richest men.
The company's success lies in the hoard of information it holds about its users — valuable information that advertisers can use to target their products and services. Its growing business has escalated competition with rival tech giants Google andApple Inc.
Now Facebook is looking to build a war chest from the IPO to dominate the Web for decades. Can Facebook stake its fortune in social networking in the wildly profitable way Google did with Internet search?
Swarms of investors can't wait to find out. Even everyday users are looking forward to poring over Facebook's prospectus — the first in-depth glimpse at Facebook's financials — as if it were the next installment of "Twilight" or "Harry Potter."
How much money the company is making is a closely guarded secret. But that will soon change.
Within days or weeks, Facebook is expected to file papers with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announcing its intent to sell stock. As part of the filing, Facebook will release a prospectus with detailed financial information, including its revenue and income.
The actual sale of stock typically occurs about three months after the initial filing.
In fevered anticipation of the IPO, shares have surged on private trading exchanges. This week, Sharespost sold a block of 70,000 shares at $34 a share. At that price, Facebook is already valued at more than $80 billion.
Facebook's expected public offering could mean pandemonium for investors and big fees for brokerages.
Some are hanging back. Just because you use Facebook doesn't mean you should own it, at least not right away, especially given the lackluster debuts of high-profile Internet companies Groupon and Zynga.
Wall Street clicks 'like' on Facebook IPO
"Expectations are so high, and there have been so many rounds of investment on private exchanges, one has to wonder how much upside is left once Facebook becomes a public company," said Anthony Valencia, media analyst at TCW Group.
Those expectations couldn't be any higher than on Facebook's splashy new Menlo Park campus 30 miles south of San Francisco on the edge of tidal mud flats and salt marshes. Every square foot of the 57-acre campus still under construction speaks to the ascendance of Facebook. Hacker Way is now the premier vanity address in Silicon Valley.
Facebook will soon pour asphalt for a main drag that cuts a broad swath through the middle of campus. By March, thousands of staffers will stroll on sidewalks or roll on bicycles and Ripstiks (two-wheeled skateboards) down the middle of a colorful urban scape lined with awning-shaded storefronts such as a noodle joint, a bike shop, Philz Coffee stand, a dry cleaners, computer help desk and a burger shack that some have dubbed Zuckerberger's even before it opens for business.
The wealth of some of the campus' new residents is already apparent in the parking lot, where a black Tesla was juicing up at an electric vehicle charging station. Facebook has purchased land across a busy highway that would give Facebook enough room to grow to more than 9,000 employees. There are already plans afoot to equip a large highway undercrossing with a giant people mover.
It's a grown-up campus for a company that is now all grown up. Friends say Zuckerberg, who declined requests for an interview, has now embraced an IPO as a natural next step for his company and a reward for its employees. But the guy who turned down a billion-dollar offer from Yahoo when he was just 22 is unlikely to change his independent stripe even after ringing the opening bell, said David Kirkpatrick, author of "The Facebook Effect."
Being publicly traded will bring heavier scrutiny from regulators alarmed at how Facebook handles users' data despite a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission in which the company agreed to privacy audits for 20 years. And Wall Street will exert pressure to woo the big campaigns from Madison Avenue advertisers that Facebook will need to pump up revenue to meet ever-rising expectations. In 2011, Facebook is believed to have raked in $4.2 billion, about what Apple generates in three weeks.
Zuckerberg probably will borrow a page from Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who famously warned investors they planned to run their Internet company unconventionally. Facebook's dual-class stock structure also ensures that Zuckerberg will retain firm control over the company and its board of directors.
Read more here http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-facebook-20120127,0,6352193.story?page=1
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Facebook Trades to Be Halted for 3 days
Shareholders of Facebook Inc., the Internet site preparing an initial public offering, are facing a three-day suspension of trading on secondary markets this week, people with knowledge of the matter said.
While buy and sell orders can be made, transactions won’t be processed by Facebook’s attorneys at Fenwick & West LLC from Jan. 25 to Jan. 27, said the people, who declined to be named because details on secondary transactions are kept private. The halt pertains to trading of Facebook shares only, one of the people said.
Facebook, the largest social-networking site, is considering raising about $10 billion in an IPO that would value the company at more than $100 billion, a person with knowledge of the situation said in November. Companies suspend trading ahead of a filing to make sure that investors can’t buy or sell until all of the information is public, said Sam Hamadeh, chief executive officer of New York-based PrivCo.
“Facebook and companies who do this don’t want to expose themselves to lawsuits related to the fact that some people had it before others and were able to trade on it,” said Hamadeh, whose firm provides research on more than 30,000 private companies. “The best way to protect yourself is to have no one able to trade.”
This week’s halt doesn’t necessarily mean the filing is imminent, the people said.
Private shares can still be traded on secondary markets between the time of the filing and the IPO, though companies are more likely to restrict the transactions closer to the public offering, Hamadeh said.
Rising Valuation
Employees and early stakeholders have been able to sell shares privately using exchanges including SharesPost Inc. and SecondMarket Inc. Buyers are typically institutional investors.
Jonathan Thaw, a spokesman for Menlo Park, California-based Facebook, declined to comment, as did Merredith Branscombe, a spokeswoman for Fenwick & West. Representatives of New York- based SecondMarket, and SharesPost, based in San Bruno, California, declined to comment.
Facebook is valued at $73.4 billion on SharesPost’s website, an estimate that takes into account transaction prices, research estimates and financing round valuations. The last contract listed on SharesPost was completed today at $34.50 a share, or an implied valuation of $82 billion.
To contact the reporters on this story: Douglas Macmillan in New York at dmacmillan3@bloomberg.net; Ari Levy in San Francisco at alevy5@bloomberg.net; Lee Spears in New York at lspears3@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jennifer Sondag at jsondag@bloomberg.net; Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net
While buy and sell orders can be made, transactions won’t be processed by Facebook’s attorneys at Fenwick & West LLC from Jan. 25 to Jan. 27, said the people, who declined to be named because details on secondary transactions are kept private. The halt pertains to trading of Facebook shares only, one of the people said.
Facebook, the largest social-networking site, is considering raising about $10 billion in an IPO that would value the company at more than $100 billion, a person with knowledge of the situation said in November. Companies suspend trading ahead of a filing to make sure that investors can’t buy or sell until all of the information is public, said Sam Hamadeh, chief executive officer of New York-based PrivCo.
“Facebook and companies who do this don’t want to expose themselves to lawsuits related to the fact that some people had it before others and were able to trade on it,” said Hamadeh, whose firm provides research on more than 30,000 private companies. “The best way to protect yourself is to have no one able to trade.”
This week’s halt doesn’t necessarily mean the filing is imminent, the people said.
Private shares can still be traded on secondary markets between the time of the filing and the IPO, though companies are more likely to restrict the transactions closer to the public offering, Hamadeh said.
Rising Valuation
Employees and early stakeholders have been able to sell shares privately using exchanges including SharesPost Inc. and SecondMarket Inc. Buyers are typically institutional investors.
Jonathan Thaw, a spokesman for Menlo Park, California-based Facebook, declined to comment, as did Merredith Branscombe, a spokeswoman for Fenwick & West. Representatives of New York- based SecondMarket, and SharesPost, based in San Bruno, California, declined to comment.
Facebook is valued at $73.4 billion on SharesPost’s website, an estimate that takes into account transaction prices, research estimates and financing round valuations. The last contract listed on SharesPost was completed today at $34.50 a share, or an implied valuation of $82 billion.
To contact the reporters on this story: Douglas Macmillan in New York at dmacmillan3@bloomberg.net; Ari Levy in San Francisco at alevy5@bloomberg.net; Lee Spears in New York at lspears3@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jennifer Sondag at jsondag@bloomberg.net; Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net
Monday, January 23, 2012
Twitter is the last of the four horsemen, the biggest names to come
out of Silicon Valley in the last decade (LinkedIn, Facebook, Zynga
and Twitter). I have been able to get a block of common
stock that is priced at a $19.75 this is a discount to where Prince
Walid of Saudi Arabia has been reported to have recently taken a $300
million stake at $20 a share valuing the company at ~$10B.
Prince Walid added an emerging brand name to an international
investment portfolio that largely includes established giants like
Apple, Citigroup and Walt Disney. Although the billionaire investor
has long been known for taking stakes in stalwarts, the Twitter deal
focuses on the next generation of blue-chip companies.
Over the summer Twitter raised $800 million in a series G round of
funding, which involved Yuri Milner’s DST, T Rowe Price, Chris Sacca
and others, was split into two parts, the first $400 million going
directly to Twitter for preferred shares and the second $400 million
used to buy out employees and existing shareholders. The financing
values the company at ~$8 billion. If you know DST at all they are
the same investment company that supported Groupon, Facebook, and
Zynga.
Twitter CEO Dick Costolo confirmed its first $400 million tranche of
a $800 million Series G closed, saying that the company has just
closed “more money than I’ve ever seen before”. In 2010 according to
GigaOm between Zynga, Facebook and Groupon, DST has a stake in
companies that are estimated to be worth more than $30 billion.
Furthermore this is DST largest single investment to date and they are
not in business to make 25% their goal is to see an aggressive
multiple on the investment.
Why Twitter? It is the way the world communicates… It’s not just
about staying connected with friends. It’s the opposite every media
organization has a Twitter account and uses them to automatically
publish ‘Real Time’ links of news stories as they become available.
More individuals are now using Twitter to provide eye-witness accounts
and to point out what’s missing from the news coverage. Both the
Hudson River landing and the Dutch crash were first reported by
everyday people on Twitter.
In recent days the Twitter revolution has been credited in rapidly
speeding up and spreading the word for the likes of #OccupyWallStreet
and in places like Egypt, Tunisia, Syria and Libya to help in
Government change. It's important to note that the real driving force
behind what happened in Egypt was communication and people's ability
to express their feelings and opinions freely and in real time. Of
course, technology helped make that communication possible in new ways
via Twitter. Like the idea or not Governments have been overthrown by
the freedom of speech and mass dissemination that Twitter allows users
to have. The twitter revolution is here to stay.
Twitter now has more than 300 million registered user and at least
100 million active users since it was launched in 2006. Half of the
active users log into the site and send out tweets each day. The site
sends out approximately 230 million tweets each day and at least 5
billion tweets a month. Twitter is on track for nearly $140 million
in revenue for 2011, up from a reported $45 million just last year.
Last year was Twitter’s first full year of selling advertising
products. In 2011, however, Promoted Tweets, Promoted Trends and
Promoted Accounts (as the company calls its various ad products)
really started ramping up. eMarketer estimates that by 2013, Twitter’s
ad revenue shall have grown to around $400 million annually.
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/saudi-prince-invests-300-million-in-twitter/
http://thenextweb.com/twitter/2012/01/16/twitter-is-adding-11-new-accounts-per-second-and-could-pass-500-million-in-february-say-report/
Contact me if you have an interest in getting involved Pre-IPO at asmventures@gmail.com
out of Silicon Valley in the last decade (LinkedIn, Facebook, Zynga
and Twitter). I have been able to get a block of common
stock that is priced at a $19.75 this is a discount to where Prince
Walid of Saudi Arabia has been reported to have recently taken a $300
million stake at $20 a share valuing the company at ~$10B.
Prince Walid added an emerging brand name to an international
investment portfolio that largely includes established giants like
Apple, Citigroup and Walt Disney. Although the billionaire investor
has long been known for taking stakes in stalwarts, the Twitter deal
focuses on the next generation of blue-chip companies.
Over the summer Twitter raised $800 million in a series G round of
funding, which involved Yuri Milner’s DST, T Rowe Price, Chris Sacca
and others, was split into two parts, the first $400 million going
directly to Twitter for preferred shares and the second $400 million
used to buy out employees and existing shareholders. The financing
values the company at ~$8 billion. If you know DST at all they are
the same investment company that supported Groupon, Facebook, and
Zynga.
Twitter CEO Dick Costolo confirmed its first $400 million tranche of
a $800 million Series G closed, saying that the company has just
closed “more money than I’ve ever seen before”. In 2010 according to
GigaOm between Zynga, Facebook and Groupon, DST has a stake in
companies that are estimated to be worth more than $30 billion.
Furthermore this is DST largest single investment to date and they are
not in business to make 25% their goal is to see an aggressive
multiple on the investment.
Why Twitter? It is the way the world communicates… It’s not just
about staying connected with friends. It’s the opposite every media
organization has a Twitter account and uses them to automatically
publish ‘Real Time’ links of news stories as they become available.
More individuals are now using Twitter to provide eye-witness accounts
and to point out what’s missing from the news coverage. Both the
Hudson River landing and the Dutch crash were first reported by
everyday people on Twitter.
In recent days the Twitter revolution has been credited in rapidly
speeding up and spreading the word for the likes of #OccupyWallStreet
and in places like Egypt, Tunisia, Syria and Libya to help in
Government change. It's important to note that the real driving force
behind what happened in Egypt was communication and people's ability
to express their feelings and opinions freely and in real time. Of
course, technology helped make that communication possible in new ways
via Twitter. Like the idea or not Governments have been overthrown by
the freedom of speech and mass dissemination that Twitter allows users
to have. The twitter revolution is here to stay.
Twitter now has more than 300 million registered user and at least
100 million active users since it was launched in 2006. Half of the
active users log into the site and send out tweets each day. The site
sends out approximately 230 million tweets each day and at least 5
billion tweets a month. Twitter is on track for nearly $140 million
in revenue for 2011, up from a reported $45 million just last year.
Last year was Twitter’s first full year of selling advertising
products. In 2011, however, Promoted Tweets, Promoted Trends and
Promoted Accounts (as the company calls its various ad products)
really started ramping up. eMarketer estimates that by 2013, Twitter’s
ad revenue shall have grown to around $400 million annually.
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/saudi-prince-invests-300-million-in-twitter/
http://thenextweb.com/twitter/2012/01/16/twitter-is-adding-11-new-accounts-per-second-and-could-pass-500-million-in-february-say-report/
Contact me if you have an interest in getting involved Pre-IPO at asmventures@gmail.com
Friday, January 13, 2012
Everything you need to know about Facebook’s potential IPO
As a leader in social media, advertising and online influence, it’s surprising that ultra-powerful startup Facebook has managed to remain a privately held company for so long.
However, the high level of success Facebook has reached privately is likely to pay off when it finally files an initial public offering (IPO), which could raise over $10 billion.
The $10 billion IPO, which only three other companies (AT&T, General Motors and Visa) have ever achieved, isn’t very surprising. Facebook is arguably the most successful social network ever created — so much so that it’s transformed from being just a “network” to an expansive platform of communication, gaming, digital commerce and marketing. The reason Facebook was able to do this is because it’s ridiculously popular, serving over 800 million active users per month.
With that many people paying attention, the potential for generating a massive amount revenue is very high. In 2011, some speculate that the company earned $4.2 billion, but the coming year should prove even more successful. By some estimates, Facebook will account for nearly 17 percent of total U.S. advertising revenue in 2012, while its advertisements will account for 28 percent of all ads seen. This suggests that Facebook will earn more ad revenue than Google, Microsoft or Yahoo by the end of 2012.
However, the high level of success Facebook has reached privately is likely to pay off when it finally files an initial public offering (IPO), which could raise over $10 billion.
The $10 billion IPO, which only three other companies (AT&T, General Motors and Visa) have ever achieved, isn’t very surprising. Facebook is arguably the most successful social network ever created — so much so that it’s transformed from being just a “network” to an expansive platform of communication, gaming, digital commerce and marketing. The reason Facebook was able to do this is because it’s ridiculously popular, serving over 800 million active users per month.
With that many people paying attention, the potential for generating a massive amount revenue is very high. In 2011, some speculate that the company earned $4.2 billion, but the coming year should prove even more successful. By some estimates, Facebook will account for nearly 17 percent of total U.S. advertising revenue in 2012, while its advertisements will account for 28 percent of all ads seen. This suggests that Facebook will earn more ad revenue than Google, Microsoft or Yahoo by the end of 2012.
Facebook shows relentless global growth
In country after country, Facebook is toppling the incumbent local social network in what seems like an unstoppable march to global dominance.
After overtaking Microsoft's Windows Live Profile in Portugal and Mexico in early 2010, Facebook eclipsed StudiVZ in Germany and Google's (GOOG) Orkut in India later that year, and soon unseated Hyves in the Netherlands, according to metrics firm comScore. Now Facebook is poised
to triumph in what has been viewed as its ultimate popularity contest, with comScore indicating the network is likely to dethrone Orkut in social media-mad Brazil when its December data is released.
Facebook's relentless spread is a vindication of founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg's growth-first principle, under which the social network has focused primarily on adding users, not building revenue, since its beginning. Facebook will surpass 1 billion users in the next few months, analysts say, and that population will be a huge asset it can tout to investors as the company prepares for an initial public offering of stock as soon as spring.
"It's been really surprising
Advertisement
to us to see how quickly Facebook has grown, not just in Western countries or English-speaking countries, but pretty much around the world," said Carmela Aquino of comScore. "I think part of it is the network effect -- when you have a big enough mass of people beginning to jump on a social network, it's only a matter of time that their friends get on the same network, and it starts to spread."
Facebook is now used by more than half the population in the U.S. and a number of other countries, according to analytics company Socialbakers, but its growth is slowing in North America and much of Europe as it approaches a saturation point. Still, as Facebook prepares for its IPO, the Menlo Park-based social networking company's massive expansion in countries like Brazil, India, Mexico, South Korea and Vietnam suggests the social network has a bright future.
For investors, Facebook's rise in Asia, South America and other developing nations "is a proof point that they can make it everywhere in the world," said Jan Rezab, CEO of Socialbakers. He believes the social network's user population could swell from more than 800 million to 1 billion as soon as April, a threshold
that would be a selling point for potential buyers of its stock. "I think they are going to announce it with the IPO; I think that's the strategic thing to do," Rezab said.
Facebook, which started in 2004 as a way for students at Ivy League universities and Stanford to socialize and didn't open up to the public until 2006, first saw a majority of its traffic coming from outside the U.S. in 2009, according to Socialbakers. Now more than four out of five Facebook users log on from other countries.
Other online social networks also have a global draw. U.S.-based Twitter and LinkedIn pull a large majority of their visitors from outside the U.S. Even the most popular Russian social network, VKontakte, draws 43 percent of its traffic from outside Russia, according to a recent comScore study on the growth of social networks, which now reach 82 percent of the world's online population, or 1.2 billion people.
Just two years ago, 46 percent of visits to LinkedIn, the professional social network, came from outside the U.S., according to data comScore prepared at the request of this newspaper. Now 62 percent come from outside the U.S.
That sense of a borderless world for successful social networks is nowhere more true than in Brazil, the world's fifth-largest country, where Google's Orkut had been the entrenched king for years. Orkut had six times the volume of Facebook's monthly traffic as recently as January 2010. But while Orkut continued to grow, Facebook's Brazilian traffic erupted in 2011, according to comScore.
People familiar with the Brazilian Internet market say there were many factors in Facebook's sudden rise in the South American nation of 200 million people, including Facebook's availability in the local language and the globalization of people's social ties.
Compared with Orkut, "Facebook is much more universal, and there are a lot of ex-Brazilians living outside Brazil," said Ron Czerny, CEO of PlayPhone, a mobile gaming platform that uses Facebook and Orkut to promote its games and has offices in Silicon Valley and Brazil. "The fact that they can connect to their friends and family, that helped (Facebook) a lot."
Czerny, who is Brazilian, said the availability of games on Facebook in the Brazilian dialect of Portuguese was another big boost. The aura of American hipness and fashion that many Brazilians associated with Facebook also held sway with many people, said Czerny and others.
At the beginning of 2010, Facebook was not the leading social network in 13 of the 43 international markets tracked by comScore. That has now dropped to six of those countries, including China, where it is blocked by the government.
Facebook believes there were other factors in its global adoption, particularly the software application launched in 2008 that allows users to collaborate to rapidly build a model that translates Facebook into their local language.
Facebook also made a key move in its purchase last year of mobile technology company Snaptu, which made software that allows more than 2,500 models of more basic-feature phones to access Facebook with much of the same functionality as an iPhone or Android smartphone. That opened a gateway to Facebook in countries where few people can afford a smartphone or a PC to go online.
Rezab also said the linguistic translation abilities of Facebook are key because it helps Facebook feel like a local experience instead of a Silicon Valley import.
"The majority of the content on Facebook, or YouTube for that matter, is purely local," Rezab said. "These networks succeeded by being globally local, if you know what I mean."
After overtaking Microsoft's Windows Live Profile in Portugal and Mexico in early 2010, Facebook eclipsed StudiVZ in Germany and Google's (GOOG) Orkut in India later that year, and soon unseated Hyves in the Netherlands, according to metrics firm comScore. Now Facebook is poised
to triumph in what has been viewed as its ultimate popularity contest, with comScore indicating the network is likely to dethrone Orkut in social media-mad Brazil when its December data is released.
Facebook's relentless spread is a vindication of founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg's growth-first principle, under which the social network has focused primarily on adding users, not building revenue, since its beginning. Facebook will surpass 1 billion users in the next few months, analysts say, and that population will be a huge asset it can tout to investors as the company prepares for an initial public offering of stock as soon as spring.
"It's been really surprising
Advertisement
to us to see how quickly Facebook has grown, not just in Western countries or English-speaking countries, but pretty much around the world," said Carmela Aquino of comScore. "I think part of it is the network effect -- when you have a big enough mass of people beginning to jump on a social network, it's only a matter of time that their friends get on the same network, and it starts to spread."
Facebook is now used by more than half the population in the U.S. and a number of other countries, according to analytics company Socialbakers, but its growth is slowing in North America and much of Europe as it approaches a saturation point. Still, as Facebook prepares for its IPO, the Menlo Park-based social networking company's massive expansion in countries like Brazil, India, Mexico, South Korea and Vietnam suggests the social network has a bright future.
For investors, Facebook's rise in Asia, South America and other developing nations "is a proof point that they can make it everywhere in the world," said Jan Rezab, CEO of Socialbakers. He believes the social network's user population could swell from more than 800 million to 1 billion as soon as April, a threshold
that would be a selling point for potential buyers of its stock. "I think they are going to announce it with the IPO; I think that's the strategic thing to do," Rezab said.
Facebook, which started in 2004 as a way for students at Ivy League universities and Stanford to socialize and didn't open up to the public until 2006, first saw a majority of its traffic coming from outside the U.S. in 2009, according to Socialbakers. Now more than four out of five Facebook users log on from other countries.
Other online social networks also have a global draw. U.S.-based Twitter and LinkedIn pull a large majority of their visitors from outside the U.S. Even the most popular Russian social network, VKontakte, draws 43 percent of its traffic from outside Russia, according to a recent comScore study on the growth of social networks, which now reach 82 percent of the world's online population, or 1.2 billion people.
Just two years ago, 46 percent of visits to LinkedIn, the professional social network, came from outside the U.S., according to data comScore prepared at the request of this newspaper. Now 62 percent come from outside the U.S.
That sense of a borderless world for successful social networks is nowhere more true than in Brazil, the world's fifth-largest country, where Google's Orkut had been the entrenched king for years. Orkut had six times the volume of Facebook's monthly traffic as recently as January 2010. But while Orkut continued to grow, Facebook's Brazilian traffic erupted in 2011, according to comScore.
People familiar with the Brazilian Internet market say there were many factors in Facebook's sudden rise in the South American nation of 200 million people, including Facebook's availability in the local language and the globalization of people's social ties.
Compared with Orkut, "Facebook is much more universal, and there are a lot of ex-Brazilians living outside Brazil," said Ron Czerny, CEO of PlayPhone, a mobile gaming platform that uses Facebook and Orkut to promote its games and has offices in Silicon Valley and Brazil. "The fact that they can connect to their friends and family, that helped (Facebook) a lot."
Czerny, who is Brazilian, said the availability of games on Facebook in the Brazilian dialect of Portuguese was another big boost. The aura of American hipness and fashion that many Brazilians associated with Facebook also held sway with many people, said Czerny and others.
At the beginning of 2010, Facebook was not the leading social network in 13 of the 43 international markets tracked by comScore. That has now dropped to six of those countries, including China, where it is blocked by the government.
Facebook believes there were other factors in its global adoption, particularly the software application launched in 2008 that allows users to collaborate to rapidly build a model that translates Facebook into their local language.
Facebook also made a key move in its purchase last year of mobile technology company Snaptu, which made software that allows more than 2,500 models of more basic-feature phones to access Facebook with much of the same functionality as an iPhone or Android smartphone. That opened a gateway to Facebook in countries where few people can afford a smartphone or a PC to go online.
Rezab also said the linguistic translation abilities of Facebook are key because it helps Facebook feel like a local experience instead of a Silicon Valley import.
"The majority of the content on Facebook, or YouTube for that matter, is purely local," Rezab said. "These networks succeeded by being globally local, if you know what I mean."
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