Social Media and Mobile Marketing: LinkedIn is it considering an IPO

Whats my opinion? Here it is:

Well I am excited about this and feel this is the eventual future for all social media sites that create value for their users. LinkedIn has proven to be a solid place to build business relationships which lead to business. I wonder how companies and entrepreneurs will decide how to utilize the many social media marketing platforms available to them? Finally in the end, it will be interesting to see which social media marketing sites prove to be legitimate "successful". That is where the crowd, including you and me ultimately decide what should survive.

Read on and then share "What's your opinion?" in the comments.

Amplify’d from www.guardian.co.uk

LinkedIn flotation rumours fuel investors' frenzy for social media

Business-focused networking site refuses to comment on reports that it is considering an initial public offering

Dominic Rushe, New York, guardian.co.uk, Thursday 6 January 2011 17.18 GMT

Article history

LinkedIn's logo.

Social networking company LinkedIn is considering a flotation as investors clamour to pour money into the new generation of internet firms.

The business-focused networking website connects 85 million professionals and was one of the first social-media websites to claim profitability. The company is not commenting on the float speculation but is reported to be considering a formal announcement in the first quarter of this year.

LinkedIn's move comes amid a feeding frenzy for social media firms that has attracted regulatory scrutiny. Earlier this week Goldman Sachs and Russian investment company Digital Sky Technologies invested $500m (£322m) in Facebook at a price that values the company at $50bn. Groupon, a social media company that offers its users local business discounts, is raising $1bn in new funds and recently rejected a $6bn takeover offer from Google. Zynga, publisher of the phenomenally popular social media games FarmVille and CityVille, is also believed to be considering an initial public offering.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the US financial watchdog, is becoming increasingly concerned about the scale of share trading in private companies. Under US law a private firm must have fewer than 500 shareholders to remain private. If it exceeds that number, it is obliged to start publishing detailed financial statements. It is this 500-shareholder rule that in part pushed both Google and Microsoft to go public.

Goldman Sachs's clients have been inundating the bank with requests for Facebook shares. The bank will use a so-called special purchase vehicle to raise and invest $1.5bn in the company – a move meant to circumnavigate the 500-shareholder rule.

Facebook's founder and chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, has said he does not want an IPO at present. But if the SEC review concludes that Facebook has moved past the 500-shareholder threshold, it could force Zuckerberg's hand.

LinkedIn was founded in 2002 by former PayPal executive Reid Hoffman. Hoffman is one of Silicon Valley's most successful investors and was also one of Facebook's early backers. The site has members in 200 countries and attracts 47.6 million visitors a month, according to internet traffic analysts Quantcast. Half the site's members are now from outside the US. It makes money from premium services and advertising, and can charge premium rates for ad space because of its white-collar audience.The site's investors include Sequoia Capital, the venture capital firm that has backed Yahoo, Google, Apple, Cisco Systems and Oracle.

Last summer Tiger Global Management bought 1% of the company, valuing it at $2bn. But analysts said the recent frenzy for social media firms was likely to push that price up.

News of a possible LinkedIn flotation was first reported by Reuters. But a spokesman for the company said: "We don't comment on speculation. An IPO is one of many tactics that we could choose to pursue."

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