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Social Networking - Tuesday, January 29, 2008

SocNet Mania: Votigo, Shozu Mig33, Naseeb, BigSwerve, Anywhere.fm, Hi5

With MySpace and Facebook reigning as the social network monsters and prospering also-rans like LinkedIn, Hi5, Bebo and others on their tails, the latest funded social networks are gunning for channels like mobile and geographies on down to Turkey and Pakistan.

Starting with Hi5, we see that the monsters of social networking traffic have an easy time raising funds. Hi5 Networks, which has more than 70M registered users, has raised $15M in debt financing from Hercules Technology Growth Capital. So the company didn't have to give up any equity to get a big $15M check.

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Votigo is not a true social network but actually an online social media platform that helps marketers get in the face of their customers through the use of user-generated content, branded social-networking communities, contests, and promotions. The firms sells to ad agencies, PR firms and marketers. Clients include: Victoria's Secret PINK, Gardenburger, ConocoPhillips, Epic, Pandora, Motley Fool, Gibson, Capitol Records.

Oakland-based Votigo has raised $1.26M in funding from hedge fund Headwaters Holdings and individual angels. The company is led by Mike La Rotonda who was Sr. Product Manager, Yahoo! 360 at Yahoo!

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Burlingame-based mobile social network Mig33 has raised $13.5M in Series B funding led by DCM led the round with return backers Accel Partners, Redpoint Ventures and Technology Venture Partners. The company had raised a $10M in a Series A round in May.

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Also in mobile social networking, London-based ShoZu has raised $12M in a Series C funding from SEB Venture Capital, Atlas Ventures, Crescendo Ventures, and TTP Ventures.

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Proving that it will go anywhere on Earth to close a deal Draper, Fisher, Jurvetson joined ePlanet Ventures in investing an undisclosed amount in Pakistan's Naseeb Networks.

Naseeb runs online recruitment, social networking, classifieds and related services in Pakistan.

Naseeb Networks owns many websites out of which one is ROZEE.PK, which claims to be Pakistan’s No. 1 job website. ROZEE.PK has offices is Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad and in the US.

The company's flagship Internet property, Naseeb.com, offers matchmaking and social networking services for the Pakistani and Arab diaspora communities. Naseeb Networks has 42 employees across its offices in Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad and San Jose.

Naseeb Networks was founded by Monis Rahman who was GM West Coast & VP Technology at ParentWatch.com and CTO & VP Products (Co-Founder) at eDaycare.com.

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In a micro M&A deal, Lijit has big BigSwerve. Founded nearly 2 years back, Boston-based BigSwerve is a blog indexer that analyzes and sorts blog comments. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Lijit Networks is a utility that gives readers the ability to search blog posts, bookmarks and blogrolls. BigSwerve indexes blog and analyzes and sorts blog comments.

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San Francisco-based musical social network Imeem has acquired fellow San Francisco firm Anywhere.FM. Anywhere.FM operates an online digital music player and Internet radio service. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. Anywhere.FM was founded last year, and has received funding from Y Combinator. Larger Imeem meanwhile has raised venture funding led by Morgenthaler Ventures.

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