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News & Updates - Thursday, August 10, 2006

Bebo Subject of Intense Buy-out Speculation

The blogoshpere has made M&A activity a sport with alpha bloggers fueling speculation via insider knowledge of deal flow.

The London-born, San Francisco-based social network Bebo is the hot-point of speculation this week. The start-up is backed to the tune of $15M (£7.8M) by the London branch of Benchmark Capital. TechCrunch speculated that BT had made a buyout offer, but that Bebo insisted on a $1B valuation. This week FT reports that Viacom is a suitor for Bebo.

Indeed this week's $900M ad guarantee to MySpace made Fox's $580M buyout of MySpace last year seem like a bargain. Bebo's founders say that MySpace might have put itself in a strait-jacket by selling to News Corp. "We can do the same kind of business development deals as MySpace. They have two parties with different interests [the old media world of News Corp and the new media My-Space] being forced to work together. They can't do something with Viacom and ITV, as those channels are competitors to other News Corp businesses. It could be quite a disadvantage."


Bebo Has a Way To Go Globally Against MySpace

But Is Strong In the UK

Read - Old media goes in pursuit of youth (FT)