After slashing half their staff earlier this year to present a leaner profile to potential buyers, Myspace has been sold (and it wasn't for 60 bitcoins and a Subway foot long Italian as rumored).
The proud new owner of that cyber graveyard is Specific Media, an advertising network who had a spare $35 million laying around. News Corp. will still hold onto a stake of less than five percent for nostalgia. The deal includes another halving of Myspace’s staff of 400, and a limited run for Myspace CEO Mike Jones and other top personnel. The sale comes just before the end of the fiscal year (tomorrow!).
There were several other bidders recently, including separate efforts by the two co-founders of Myspace, Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson. The most recent lead suitor was a group including Activision CEO Bobby Kotick, but the deal fell apart, leaving Specific and private equity firm Golden Gate Capital. Specific Media was founded in 1999 and helps marketers buy digital ads for the interweb, online video, and mobile devices. The company now ranks among the largest online advertising networks in the country, reaching 170.9 million or about 79% of the U.S. internet users just last month.
While the company gets data about Myspace users which can be used for ad targeting, it's still pouring a lot of money into a domain that is losing attention and members to Facebook on a daily basis. But hey, it's their money to waste, and they can try to make it back
The proud new owner of that cyber graveyard is Specific Media, an advertising network who had a spare $35 million laying around. News Corp. will still hold onto a stake of less than five percent for nostalgia. The deal includes another halving of Myspace’s staff of 400, and a limited run for Myspace CEO Mike Jones and other top personnel. The sale comes just before the end of the fiscal year (tomorrow!).
There were several other bidders recently, including separate efforts by the two co-founders of Myspace, Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson. The most recent lead suitor was a group including Activision CEO Bobby Kotick, but the deal fell apart, leaving Specific and private equity firm Golden Gate Capital. Specific Media was founded in 1999 and helps marketers buy digital ads for the interweb, online video, and mobile devices. The company now ranks among the largest online advertising networks in the country, reaching 170.9 million or about 79% of the U.S. internet users just last month.
While the company gets data about Myspace users which can be used for ad targeting, it's still pouring a lot of money into a domain that is losing attention and members to Facebook on a daily basis. But hey, it's their money to waste, and they can try to make it back
No comments:
Post a Comment