Facebook disclosed it raised $1.5 billion in its latest private financing at a $50 billion valuation. The company said it expected to pass 500 shareholders in 2011 and therefore planned to start filing public financial reports no later than April 30, 2012. The article notes an investment from Goldman Sachs as part of the financing. While the piece acknowledges Facebook could report financials without an IPO, it argues that beginning regular public reporting would leave little reason to remain private. The report highlights SEC concerns about private trading of Facebook stock on venues like SecondMarket and pooled funds engineered to skirt disclosure rules. TechCrunch concludes that, given the timetable for public reporting, an IPO is likely by April 2012. Facebook operates a social networking platform that connects users and sells advertising products. Advertising products are performing strongly; the company reports tens of thousands of advertisers and says it is on track to create a self-sustaining business. Executives reported revenue growth of greater than 70% year‑over‑year and expect to be cash‑flow positive sometime in 2010. Facebook is exploring international monetization through advertising and user-generated micropayments and has experimented with payments. The company is building out teams and international offices to work with large brand advertisers and is testing features such as video chat. Management said it is taking capital that will help realize the long‑term vision and that the recent investment provides a cash cushion and flexibility. Facebook is a social networking website that the article says has over 70 million active users and about 109 million monthly visitors. The company is raising $100 million in debt to scale the service, bringing its total capital raised to nearly half a billion dollars. The most recent round will be used to add roughly 50,000 servers to improve capacity. The site is described as sometimes very slow, which the company aims to address with the server expansion. The article compares Facebook's infrastructure to Google and Microsoft, noting Google operates at least a million servers and is adding 500,000 per year while Microsoft is adding 200,000 per year. Sources cited are VentureBeat and BusinessWeek. Facebook is a U.S. social networking site. The article reports Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing has increased his stake by another $40 million or more. He had previously invested $60 million, bringing his personal total to at least $100 million. The piece references a $15 billion valuation that was cited when Ka-shing first invested alongside Microsoft. The article does not provide details on the financing instrument or other deal terms. No other investors or financial details are disclosed. The article describes Facebook as an Internet-only company that recently secured significant outside capital. Microsoft invested $240 million last month at a reported $15 billion valuation while expanding an advertising relationship with Facebook. The valuation was described as tenuous because Facebook could not find an independent third party to corroborate it. Kara Swisher reported that Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing invested $60 million. That new investment brings Facebook's total capital raised to just shy of $340 million. The piece notes that this level of funding could allow Facebook to remain a private company for years, while questioning the durability of the $15 billion valuation.

Total raised

$2.2B

Funding rounds

7

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Jan 2011