Posts Tagged ‘foursquare’

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Facebook’s IPO One of World’s Largest (AP)
Facebook priced its IPO at $38 per share on Thursday, at the top of expectations. Now, regular investors will have a chance to buy stock in Facebook for the first time. The stock will begin trading on the Nasdaq sometime this morning. The ticker symbol will be FB. The Verge To commemorate the momentous day, co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been invited by NASDAQ to ring the stock exchange’s opening bell. He won’t be at the New York stock market in person, but the ceremony will be carried out remotely from Facebook’s Menlo Park, Calif., headquarters Reuters The scramble for shares in what is one of largest initial public offerings in U.S. history quickly divided the haves from the have-nots on Thursday. Those with big brokerage accounts and a long history as customers of Wall Street firms likely got at least part of their orders for Facebook shares filled, but would-be buyers who had no such ties were lucky to get any. Bloomberg Businessweek The average first-day “pop” for a technology company is 32 percent; if Facebook follows that trend, it’ll be worth $137 billion by day’s end. But there’s little about Facebook that’s average, including its public offering. TechCrunch Facebook kicked off its 31st Hackathon Thursday evening to celebrate the IPO. Hackathons are a company tradition. They’re a place where engineers and other non-technical employees get to stay out all night building concepts into real products that sometimes eventually get shipped. The Huffington Post The big money has already been staked out. Facebook’s founders and early investors own huge amounts of stock. When the company goes public, some will hold on to their stock; others will walk away with cash after selling shares at the IPO. The Daily Beast The $104 billion Facebook IPO testifies to the still considerable innovative power of Silicon Valley, but the hoopla over the new wave of billionaires won’t change the basic reality of the state’s secular economic decline. AllFacebook We now know that Facebook’s initial public offering will open at $38 per share. But what price will it reach at the end of the trading day? Let us know your prediction by taking our poll. The Washington Post On Thursday, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., used the anticipation surrounding Facebook’s big day to talk again about why Congress needs to close loopholes in corporate tax law. Levin objected to Facebook’s decision to issue its employees options to buy company stock in the future at its original issuing price. Read more

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Facebook IPO Pitch: Can it Win Big Investors? (Mashable) Looking ahead toward its much-anticipated IPO later this month, Facebook has produced a 30-minute video pitch to show big-time investors why sinking money into a publicly traded Facebook will be a good idea. It’s an interesting take on the normal business investment pitch video — instead of a heavy emphasis on dry finance numbers, Facebook plays to the heartstrings. Reuters In the presentation, chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg said mobile is a key area of growth for Facebook, and that the company would use sponsored stories to generate more advertising income. Advertisers pay Facebook to highlight certain stories. These sponsored posts recently started running on the News Feeds of Facebook mobile users. Financial Times Pricing for Facebook’s premium “social” advertisements continues to rise, two recent studies have found — a positive indicator that could offset concerns about a dip in advertising growth and help sentiment towards the internet company’s initial public offering. A report to be released today by Marin Software, a digital marketing platform that processes more than $100 million worth of spending on Facebook, found a 26 percent increase over the last year in the cost per click for “premium” ad formats. AllFacebook Facebook’s initial public offering slated for May 18 hasn’t slowed its acquisition frenzy, as the social network gobbled up location-based mobile application Glancee for an undisclosed amount. Glancee, an app for Apple iOS and Android devices, allowed users to sign in with Facebook and discover other users within a specified distance with similar interests. Fortune The economy is improving. Berkshire Hathaway’s stock is undervalued. And Facebook is a crapshoot. That was the general feeling at a gathering of investors on the eve of Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meeting. Read more

Foursquare has been rolling out a bunch of new features lately. This latest addition gives the check-in service a purpose beyond announcing one’s arrival after the fact.

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There’s a new purportedly low-fat frozen yogurt place in our neighborhood, and it’s got the buzz that you can only get in a smaller town.  Everyone from the most skeptical connoisseurs to the high school girls are chasing this new frozen yogurt, and what better way to show off that you’re in on the new trend than by checking in on Facebook or Foursquare.  Well, if I had written that two years ago, I wouldn’t have mentioned Facebook, but since FB got in the check-in game, Foursquare has been working hard to differentiate itself to stay relevant.

Today they’re offering businesses, like the aforementioned frozen yogurt shop, a way to quickly and easily control their own Foursquare site.

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Path Confirms Series B Funding From Redpoint, Richard Branson and Others (AllThingsD)
CEO Dave Morin noted the investors’ commitment to building Path “for the long term,” and said the funding would be used for “international growth and expansion as well as user adoption.” Inside Mobile Apps In February, Path revealed it has passed 2 million registered users, more than half of which had joined since the service relaunched in December as a personal journal app, pivoting from its original vision as a private photo-sharing service. GigaOM Ever since Facebook decided that Instagram was worth $1 billion, there has been recurring talk of Path, another social service being the next big buyout target. And while I am happy for the Path team, I find the comparisons with Instagram unfounded and premature. Business Insider Here’s what’s odd: RedPoint just invested in a startup that is in many ways very similar to Path: Caterina Fake’s new startup PinWheel. Read more

Foursquare‘s location-sharing service has reached 20 million users who have posted 2 billion check-ins, according to a report by VentureBeat.  The New York-based company is currently celebrating its third annual Foursquare Day in honor of today’s date (which corresponds to the number four, squared) with a new 4sqDay badge for anyone who checks in with the service.

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Facebook Delves Deeper Into Search (Bloomberg Businessweek)
Searching the social network could get a lot better in the near future. About two dozen Facebook engineers, led by a former Google engineer named Lars Rasmussen, are working on an improved search engine, say two people familiar with the project who did not want to be named because the company is in a quiet period ahead of its IPO. AllFacebook Speaking of the IPO, speculation about Facebook’s search initiatives heated up when the social network announced its intentions to go public February 1. That week co-founder and chief executive officer Mark Zuckerberg posted a picture of his desk, in which a MacBook displaying what looked like a Facebook page with a large search box was visible. SocialTimes Google, which owns 67 percent of the search market in the U.S., has a clear advantage in being able to index sites from across the Web, while Facebook appears to be working internally with pages and profiles. Mashable Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has consistently downplayed the level of direct competition between Facebook and Google. “I don’t think that this is going to be the type of situation when one company wins all this stuff,” he told Charlie Rose of PBS last fall. Tom’s Guide So how will this new search engine affect Facebook’s relationship with Microsoft? Zuckerberg still meets every few months with Qi Lu, president of Microsoft’s online services division, sources claim. There may be no ruffling of feathers at all, but rather a huge opportunity for two separate types of search engines to work together in harmony to create a huge Google rival, loaded with data Google probably still covets. Read more

There was a time when a foodie had only the local newspaper restaurant reviews as an aide to navigating himself towards the nearest quality eaterie.  Along came the web, and search, and finally social, and now the world of dining on recommendation has been completely transformed.  It’s not difficult to find recommendations from a whole host of people nowadays — be they everyday folks, restaurant critics or your own Facebook friends.  A new infographic takes a look at how in reality, the most important new restaurant critic is actually you.

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Walk into a Walgreens, pull out your mobile phone, check in to Foursquare and get 50% off an Arizone Ice Tea.  That’s the new experience being offered by a partnership between Walgreens and Foursquare, and it seems pretty attractive.  New uses of social media like this provide a win-win-win situation, where foursquare gets another check-in and interested user, Walgreens gets a sale and the user gets a discount.  It’s surprising how little this kind of couponing service is currently being used, but I have a feeling this will be big in the future.

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If you are at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, FL on August 27-30 or the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, NC from September 3-5, don’t forget to check in on Foursquare. The location-based site has partnered with TIME magazine on politically-themed badges to unlock when you check in at the conventions and surrounding events.

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