Social Network Hi5 gets $20 million
Social Networking world these days may seem like all-Facebook-all-the-time, but there are other social nets that are gaining traction, and are drawing interest from the venture capital community. Hi5, a San Francisco-based social networking start-up is said to have raised about $20 million in its latest round of funding. The VC firm involved in this round of funding is said to be Mohr Davidow Ventures. (Update:) The company had raised some angel funding previously, and this is company’s first institutional round.
The company co-founded by Ramu Yalamanchi, started out as a social-network-plus matrimonial site targeting the Indian diaspora, but later morphed into a social network, and since then has gained popularity in some Latin American countries, Mongolia, Tunisia and Romania. The company has about 30 million members and serves up 200 million pages a day.
If you look at this social networking map of the world, one finds that there are quite a few international-only players. Someone like Google or Yahoo should attempt a large scale consolidation – or at least that is what Hi5′s backers must be hoping for.
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The whole ad thing itself is very obfuscating…now throw in the fact that most of your users are in Mongolia, Romania etc. I wouldn’t know where to start when it comes to an ad based biz model.
Happy to see that not everyone is rolling over and playing dead.
Hi5 is not differentiating itself or offering any kind of unique value proposition that Myspace or Facebook doesn’t already offer. As you suggested, this company probably exists solely to get bought out (i.e. it stands for nothing, has no values, no purpose other than to enrich its VCs and founders).
Hi5 is not differentiating itself or offering any kind of unique value proposition that Myspace or Facebook doesn’t already offer. As you suggested, this company probably exists solely to get bought out (i.e. it stands for nothing, has no values, no purpose other than to enrich its VCs and founders).
Judging by how far Ramu got on minimal resources I’m sure they’ll do great with some actual funding now! Congrats to Hi5 Team!
Latest round of financing? How about only round of financing. By staying lean and growing organically Hi5 hi5 the Alexa top 15 while running a profit.
Also, not mentioned above is that Hi5′s big market is Portugal.
If FaceBook loses its upcoming court battle, Hi5 will have an opportunity to gain significant U.S. readership.
Three of Facebook Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s former Harvard buddies are alleging that Zuckerberg stole the idea, source code and the business plan for Facebook in 2003 while working as a programmer for them. The suit alleges copyright infringement, stealing trade secrets, fraud and breach of contract.
On Wednesday, the claimants will be asking a federal judge to give them control of Facebook and its assets, as well as grant them damages. If this happens…and mind you I say if, Hi5 will be giving Hi5’s.
Om – As one of the commentators indicated this is the first institutional round by the company. Whats phenomenal about them is the fact that with 40 odd people they sustain the same traffic as Facebook.
congrats to the hi5 team. BTW, are you planning on interviewing anyone from the team? Would love to hear the real story (the whole indian angle seems interesting)?
Neal and others,
thanks for letting me know about this being the first institutional round. I knew they took some angel funding, but wasn’t quite sure.
On the Indian angle, they had started out as a matrimonial site, Sona.com but that didn’t work out. So they morphed into a social network.
I hope I can find someone to email me back and touch base. I did drop them an email but no word just yet.
The corporate money that is being thrown at these sites is astronomical. I recognize that the value of advertising to a group that owns one of these sites but it is really ineffective! If these sites wanted to get serious about their business, they would be advertising for Major Corporation’s not pointless icon and ring tone ads.
Jerry R. Reynolds
Alimoe Developing
jerry@alimoeinc.com