Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

Facebook summons Wall Street for pre-IPO briefing

Friday, March 16th, 2012

Facebook Inc is taking the next step on its IPO journey and has summoned research analysts from Wall Street banks to its Menlo Park headquarters early next week for a pre-roadshow briefing to discuss the finer points of its business and books.

The world’s largest social network, which is racing toward what would be Silicon Valley’s largest ever initial public offering, will not disclose new information during the meeting with analysts.

Instead, it will outline its strategy and answer questions on how to analyze its operations and help analysts build models on its financials, two sources told Reuters on condition of anonymity because the meeting is not public.

Called a “due diligence meeting”, such pre-roadshow pow-wows are standard fare for future debutantes.

It is not clear how many analysts have been invited. One source said analysts from five to 10 of the largest banks underwriting Facebook’s IPO will likely attend the meeting.

A second source said analysts from most banks helping underwrite the offering have been invited to the meeting, scheduled for Monday. Both sources would not elaborate because of the conditions of the presentation. (more…)

Facebook passes Google as most visited site of 2010

Monday, January 3rd, 2011

Social network also is the most searched-for term of the year, says Hitwise

It looks like 2010 was indeed the year that Facebook’s success exploded.

For the first time ever, U.S. Web surfers visited the social networking site more than any other site in 2010, beating out Internet behemoth Google, according to a report from Hitwise, an Internet analytics firm.

Facebook, which had a flood of good and bad publicity last year, grabbed 8.93% of all U.S. visits between January and November 2010. Google, which had been in the top spot in 2009, slipped to the No. 2 position with 7.19% of all visits, Hitwise said.

The analytics firm also reported that Yahoo! Mail came ranked third with 3.52% of all visits, while the main Yahoo! site was fourth with 3.3%. YouTube rounded out the top five with 2.65% of all site visits.

Facebook had been creeping up on Google during the last several months.

While Google has long been at the top of the heap when it comes to grabbing the most visitors and time spent on a Web site Facebook began making its mark last summer. (more…)

Facebook Top Searched Term

Wednesday, December 29th, 2010

Facebook was the top searched term overall in 2010, the second straight year that the social networking website has topped web queries, while it was also the most visited website this year, according to data provider Experian Hitwise.

Hitwise reported four variations of the term “Facebook” were among the top 10 terms and accounted for nearly 3.5% of searches overall.

The term “Facebook login” moved up from the ninth spot in 2009 to the second spot this year, Hitwise said. YouTube was the third most-searched term this year, followed by Craigslist, Myspace and Facebook.com. Analysis of the search terms revealed that social networking related terms dominated the results, accounting for 4.2% of the top 50 searches.

Facebook was the top-visited website for the first time in 2010, accounting for 8.9% of all U.S. visits between January and November. Google Inc.’s (GOOG) namesake website ranked second, followed by Yahoo Inc.’s (YHOO) Yahoo! Mail site, Yahoo, and Google’s YouTube.

Hitwise also reported Kim Kardashian was the personality that drew the most searches for the year, while Star Wars was the top movie draw and Lady Gaga was the most searched artist. In the sports category, Tiger Woods and the Dallas Cowboys topped the athlete and sports team searches, respectively.

Facebook 2010 Sales Said Likely to Reach $2 Billion

Friday, December 17th, 2010

Facebook Inc., the world’s most popular social-networking service, is likely to generate 2010 revenue of about $2 billion, a larger sum than projected earlier, according to three people familiar with the matter.

Sales will more than double from 2009, said the people, who declined to be identified because the privately held company doesn’t disclose revenue. Facebook had $700 million to $800 million in sales last year, and the 2010 figure was previously expected to be closer to $1.5 billion, according to two other people familiar with the matter earlier this year.

Facebook’s more than half a billion users have made it an attractive target for advertisers, including Coca-Cola Co., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Adidas AG. In October, Facebook surpassed Yahoo! Inc. when ranked by the number of global users, making it No. 3 behind Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp., according to ComScore Inc., a research firm in Reston, Virginia.

“The love affair of consumers with social networks is an abiding one,” said Karsten Weide, an analyst at IDC in San Mateo, California. “All the big brands are there.”

Jonathan Thaw, a spokesman for Palo Alto, California-based Facebook, declined to comment.

Facebook, founded in 2004, would reach $2 billion faster than Yahoo and at almost the same pace as Google. Yahoo, founded in 1994, posted revenue of $1.6 billion in 2003 and $3.6 billion in 2004. Google, founded in 1998, reached $1.5 billion in 2003 and then $3.2 billion in 2004. (more…)

Facebook Failed To Kill Emails

Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010

Despite some predictions otherwise, the rise of social networking hasn’t pushed email and instant messaging into obscurity just yet says a report by The Nielsen Company.

Although both saw double-digit declines in share of time, email remains as the third heaviest activity online (8.3 percent share of time) while instant messaging is fifth, accounting for four percent of Americans online time.

The way U.S. consumers spend their Internet time on their mobile phones paints a slightly different picture to that of Internet use from computers. In a Nielsen survey of mobile web users, there is a double-digit (28 percent) rise in the prevalence of social networking behavior, but the dominance of email activity on mobile devices continue with an increase from 37.4 percent to 41.6 percent of U.S. mobile Internet time.

Americans spend nearly a quarter of their time online on social networking sites and blogs, up from 15.8 percent just a year ago (43 percent increase) according to new research released today from The Nielsen Company. Though the company did not give a breakup of the social networking sites, but considering the popularity of Facebook it is apparent where you spend most of your time.

The research revealed that Americans spend a third their online time (36 percent) communicating and networking across social networks, blogs, personal email and instant messaging.
(more…)

2010 The World’s Most Innovative Companies

Monday, February 22nd, 2010

Even in these tough times, surprising and extraordinary efforts are under way in businesses across the globe. From politics to technology, energy, and transportation; from marketing to retail, health care, and design, each company on the following pages illustrates the power and potential of innovative ideas and creative execution.
HP Acquires 3Com for $2.7 Billion, Brings Fight to Cisco DreamWorks Animation Has Become a Tech Incubator What Ever Happened to HP’s Augmented Reality Game? Topics:Innovation, Most innovative companies, Hewlett-Packard Company, PG&E Corporation, Amazon.com Inc., General Electric Company, Samsung Corporation (more…)