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Angry Birds studio head claims $1.2B valuation too low, 'maybe' going public next year
Angry Birds is way, way popular -- sure -- but it is so popular as to elevate its progenitor's valuation beyond that of its already sky-high $1.2 billion estimate? CEO Peter Vesterbacka seems to think so, telling Bloomberg, "We're happy with our valuation but we think it's probably a bit north of that," referring to the aforementioned insanely high number. Beyond astronomical sales of the hit fowl flinger, Vesterbacka's company has been pulling in additional revenue from merchandising. Millions of dollars every month, in fact, via the company's website -- apparently just the stuffed toys are selling "a million units a month," which doesn't account for Halloween costumes, movie licensing, clothing, and various other tchochkes. "We are very, very profitable. We're not a publicly traded company yet we can fund our own growth," Vesterbacka boasts in the interview, all the while attempting to bolster his company's value when it does go public. He doesn't offer an exact date, but says, "maybe a year from now" Rovio will be making its public stock offer. When we last asked market analysts back in March how Rovio would fare an IPO, we were answered with reservation. And despite another seven months of earnings under the company's belt, we'd wager Vesterbacka's valuation estimates are a bit more lofty than the reality of things. But hey, we're not running any multimillion dollar corporations.
Zynga's profit drops 95 percent in year-over-year Q2
Zynga's profit fell from $27.2 million in Q2 2010 to $1.3 million in Q2 2011, a 95 percent decrease, an IPO filing with the SEC revealed Wednesday. Zynga's profit measures how much money the company is truly retaining, while revenue measures how much it is making, before expenses. To that end, Zynga's revenue grew over 100 percent year-on-year, to $279.1 million; however, this growth is slowing, rising 15 percent from its March quarter, while March rose 24 percent from the previous quarter. Zynga's "bookings" measure revenue directly from ad sales and microtransactions before any adjustments, such as the 30 percent Facebook claims, and these were down for the first time in company history, dropping 4 percent to hit the super-low, rock-bottom, Ramen-every-night number of $274.7 million. So far it looks like someone took some extra vacations on their new yachts this quarter. Or not. Zynga attributes its profit loss to two things: It didn't release any new games until Empires and Allies in March 2011, and it focused more on internal growth, hiring and acquisitions this quarter. All of this stagnating growth and dipping profit-margins means only one thing -- Zynga's valuation was increased in this same analysis, rising from $13.98 billion to $14.05 billion. Because that's how money works.
Hulu may not sell after all, bidding drama continues
Hulu has been dressed in its Sunday best for some time now hoping to attract potential buyers -- but according to Reuters, a slew of speed bumps have slowed down the process and may even kill all hopes of selling the service. According to sources, the first bump in the road can be attributed to Hulu's owners -- News Corp., Disney, NBC Universal and Providence Equity Partners -- who may not all be on the same page when it comes to selling the service. Without a unified front, it's been hard for the company to find an acceptable offer from the likes of Google, Amazon, DirecTV and Dish Network, who have all talked about bidding between $500 million to $2 billion. As the service awaits a new round of bids next week, it's been said that the major players involved have (unsurprisingly) agreed to reject any lowball offers. Despite a growing numbers of subscribers, it's entirely uncertain whether anyone will step in to clean up the company's hot mess -- we're sure the drama would make for a perfect Hulu Plus exclusive, though.
Zynga reveals intent to go public
Zynga today announced the launch of its new, sure-to-be-massive 'Ville social game, in which players from disparate backgrounds will be able to log on, buy a portion of a company through microtransactions and watch their profits grow! This new venture differs from other Zynga hits like FarmVille and FrontierVille in just a few key ways. 1. It doesn't actually have "Ville" in the title. 2. Players play with actual, totally real money. 3. Players' company won't necessarily grow. In fact, it may shrink through no fault of their own. 4. The company is Zynga, which made almost $600 million in revenue in 2010. 5. It's not a game, but a stock offering. OK, so maybe Zynga's filing of an S-1 form, detailing its intent to become a publicly traded company at some point in the future, isn't a new game announcement. But if you guys know of a better way to trick you into reading a story involving both the stock market and casual games, we'd love to hear it.
Pandora Media offering IPO tomorrow
Music service Pandora is set to introduce its stock to the public tomorrow, becoming one more in a series of social networking and online service companies going with an IPO. Pandora isn't specifically an iOS company, of course, given that its music service runs both through browsers and on a number of platforms. But the company's iOS app has helped its profile. It's consistently stayed one of the top free apps on the App Store. The company's offering 14.7 million shares initially. Pandora's future wasn't ever in actual jeopardy, but certainly the value of the company's app was in question during the lead-up to last week's Apple keynote at WWDC. For a while, iCloud was rumored as being an iTunes streaming service like Pandora, allowing you to listen to your music collection through any iOS device. Those rumors turned out to be untrue so far. iCloud and iTunes Match are only designed to help you sync your iTunes songs across devices, not listen to them remotely. For those whose music collections are too big to fit on an iOS device, Pandora is still one of the main ways to listen to extra music. [via Mashable]
Report: Zynga filing for IPO in the next two weeks
Alright, we're gonna get all of the boring business stuff out of the way up front: FarmVille creator Zynga is reportedly "poised to file" for its IPO (Initial Public Offering), effectively going from a private company to a public one. Financial firm Goldman Sachs is said to be "among the lead bankers" heading up the offering, which is expected as early as this week or "next week at the latest." Still with us? We know -- that was just as exhausting for us as it was for you. So why should you care? Because the company could rival -- or handily best -- publishing contemporaries like Activision, EA, and Take-Two. The social game publisher's last valuation pegged it at a cool $10 billion, a number All Things D's Kara Swisher believes could climb even higher for an IPO. For comparison's sake, the largest public game publisher, Activision Blizzard, is valued at $13.07 billion as of mid-day today ... and that includes the Call of Duty series and World of Warcraft. With a $10 billion IPO, Zynga would become the second largest game publisher in North America, eclipsing EA's current valuation of $7.81 billion. Zynga reps declined to comment.
Facebook, Google rumored to be vying for Skype deal
Like two knights jostling for the hand of a fair maiden, both Facebook and Google appear to be courting the graces of Skype. A source close to Facebook recently told Reuters that CEO Mark Zuckerberg is thinking about buying Skype outright, as part of a deal that could be worth $3 to $4 billion. A second source, meanwhile, claimed that both Facebook and Google are more interested in forming a joint venture with the teleconferencing company, which has yet to issue an IPO. With discussions still in a nascent stage, both suitors are playing their cards close to their chests, while Skype, rather coyly, has declined to comment on the speculation. At this point, details are still hazy and rumor-infused, though it's certainly not shocking to hear these kinds of murmurs buzzing around. Skype's been integrating Facebook more deeply into its software for a while now and has gradually branched out to Android, as well (albeit with mixed results). Both Facebook and Google would also stand to benefit from Skype's millions of users and all the targeted advertising potential they'd offer. Until we receive more substantiated reports, however, all discussions of possible unions remain restricted to the realm of conjecture.
Martin Jetpack flies again, sees IPO on horizon but no commercial sales yet (video)
We were all aflutter this time last year when it was announced that the Martin Jetpack was finally available commercially and would be heading out to eager buyers in exchange for $86,000. Regrettably, the time since then hasn't been filled with bunches of happy new owners levitating on the power of their dual-fan-equipped Jetpack and even less encouragement can be found on the product's website, which still says that sales to private individuals will begin only once "development and refinement" of the vehicle is complete. To that end, we've got video of the Jetpack's latest test, which shows it elevating as high as it's ever done, but even that's tinged by the fact it's carrying a testing dummy and is remotely controlled by a grounded human below. Ah well, at least the company itself seems to be in good shape still and is looking forward to floating about 30 percent of its value on the local stock market in order to gain extra funding. We get the feeling if they could just start selling the darn things, cashflow shouldn't be a problem. Video after the break. [Thanks, Sean]
Counting Angry Birds before they hatch: dev talks US IPO, analysts need track record
Angry Birds developer Rovio has been on a roll: raking in millions of unit sales, breaking through to the mainstream and recently receiving another $42 million from investors. Now the company is talking about going public on the Nasdaq with an IPO in the next five years. "At an estimated value of nearly $300 million, it would still be considered a relatively small company," EEDAR's Jesse Divnich explained when we asked about the company's chances. "Gameloft, for example has a current market cap of $344 million (the cost for someone to own every share of the company), this is compared to Activsion which has a market valuation of over $12 billion, and Google at $185 billion. In fact, most large mutual funds typically don't invest in anything with a market cap under $1 billion. If they do, they typically classify them as 'high-risk' or 'aggressive plays.'" Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter had similar reservations about the company telling Joystiq, "Any company can go public, but the rule of thumb is that the company has at least $50 million of annual revenue before they try to sell stock. That revenue has to be recurring, and I think that is an obstacle for Rovio, which so far is a one-hit wonder. If they can replicate what they've done with Angry Birds, there might be some interest." Pachter also mentioned that the administrative costs of being public is about $5 million annually, which is why small companies don't usually take the stock route.
Fusion-io IPO filing discloses list of prestigious clients, led by Facebook
Before last week, we'd gone well over a year without discussing solid state storage purveyors Fusion-io -- and their extremely expensive and expeditious flash drives -- but things seem to have been ticking along just fine behind the scenes. While the company's unlikely to have sold many ioDrives to good old Joe Consumer, its upcoming IPO application features an impressive list of corporate clients, highlighted by Facebook, its biggest customer, IBM, HP, and Credit Suisse -- the latter using Fusion-io technology to speed up the mathematical alchemy of making money where there was none before. Taken together with strategic investments from Samsung and Dell, these deals paint a rosy outlook for the Woz-employing startup, however it's worth noting that profitability is still a decent way away. Fusion-io's rapid growth is costing it more than it's making at the moment, which is most likely to have catalyzed its current decision to go public and collect its biggest round of investments yet. Let's hope the investor prospectus includes a forecast for when things like the ioXtreme might actually become affordable to non-millionaires, eh?
PopCap considering IPO, not likely revealing any new IP in 2011
We're just gonna level with you, folks -- we're scared. Frankly, reading this weekend's CNBC report that Plants vs. Zombies developer PopCap Games is considering an IPO worries us greatly. In so many words, it means that the quirky indie studio could go from private to public, meaning that the company could go from being beholden to itself to being beholden to investors. It also means that PopCap could expand far more rapidly -- and that you could own a piece of the action. As it stands, the studio pulled in over $100 million last year in revenues and, according to CNBC, is the third largest Facebook developer -- handily besting Disney's user numbers with just two games of its own (versus Disney's 37!). PopCap doesn't deny the possibility of the IPO -- it evenregistered with the US Securities and Exchange Commission -- with company prez David Roberts saying, "I do think we'll be ready internally. Whether the market is ready remains to be seen. It has got to be right for us." Amazingly, CNBC also asked Roberts if he would comment on the long ago trademarked "Yetitrain" name. He didn't. That name, however, is still amazing. Unfortunately, we may not be hearing anything about it anytime soon. Roberts stated, "Don't hold your breath" when asked about the possibilty of a new franchise being announced this year.
Meizu M8 ceases production amid pressure from Apple and intellectual property office
Well, can't say we didn't see this coming; we're just surprised that it's taken this long for Meizu to take a hit over its notorious handset. In case you have no idea what we're talking about, earlier this month said Chinese company's been in heated talks with Apple due to the M8 smartphone bearing an "appearance roughly similar" to the iPhone. Seriously, that's the only reason Apple provided for the accusation, if CEO Jack Wong is to be trusted (and hey, he did kinda ask for it). Anyhow, the latest development is that Meizu's bowing to pressure from both the provincial intellectual property office and Cupertino, and announced that it's shutting down production lines for its flagship M8 this month. This is no doubt a big blow to the company, but it might get even nastier -- here's what Jack said in one of his many frustrated forum postings: Apple requested that we cease manufacturing the M8 this month, we agreed but then [Apple] came back and asked for a sales ban instead. I can cope with a production freeze, but not with having our shops closed and thus not being able to use up our inventory. If Apple and the provincial IPO take another insatiable step, I can only go head to head against them. So, it looks like the M8's all set for an early retirement, either way -- it doesn't look like Apple's going to let this one go easily, and Jack's also expressed concern over the fact that the IPO has the power to shut his factory down without going to court. That said, things are still looking positive for the elusive M9 -- from the sounds of it, Meizu's upcoming Android phone isn't affected by this takedown (yet); but the question is whether Jack and co. can keep the shops running until a December launch for their next flagship device. Oh well, hang in there, Meizu!
Zynga hires new CFO, Vranesh becomes chief accounting officer
For those of you keeping a diligent collection of Zynga executive trading cards, that 2009 Mark Vranesh as CFO card is about to become worth a whole lot more -- the social game company has just hired on Dave Wehner as its new CFO, pushing Vranesh to the chief accounting officer position. Vranesh's new position will have him reporting to the new CFO. Wehner comes from a background in financial work, acting as the managing director at investment banking firm Allen & Co. since 2001. VentureBeat speculates that this hire could be one of many clues that the company is about to go public, but "a source familiar with the matter" believes that possibility is unlikely, instead positing that Zynga will continue hiring execs/buying other companies. Either way, we're still worried about the impending takeover of our lives by the Zynga/Google partnership. It's coming any day now, folks!
GameFly going public, files $50 million IPO
GameFly, game rental service and media entity, has filed a $50 million initial public offering with the Securities and Exchange Commission and has applied to appear as "GFLY" on the NASDAQ ticker. The IPO registration form lays out many details that were previously unknown about the privately held company. Tidbits include that GameFly has approximately 334,000 subscribers as of September 2009 and generated $84.7 milllion in revenue in its fiscal year ending March 2009. Additionally, the form suggests that GameFly's collection of media sites, which includes the ShackNews properties, apparently draws 4.4 million monthly unique visitors. GameFly is currently practicing a "quiet period" and representatives could not comment on this report. [Via BusinessInsider; thanks, Wolvie75]
Deutsche Telekom rumored to be eyeing T-Mobile USA spinoff
Not a week goes by that we don't hear of investor pressure on Deutsche Telekom to strengthen its financials and offload underperforming units -- T-Mobile USA included -- and the American outpost is back in the spotlight this evening coming off a report out of The Wall Street Journal that a spinoff might indeed be in the works. According to our favorite "people familiar with the matter," DT has reached out to a few banks with the goal of raising enough capital for T-Mobile through an IPO that it'd be able to continue to fund its network build-out, something that's going to become increasingly critical as it fends off 7.2Mbps HSPA and 4G competition from all of its national competitors. There are a few scenarios allegedly being discussed, ranging from a full-on excision of T-Mobile from its corporate parent to a merger with another US wireless firm -- but the plan gaining most traction internally is said to involve selling around 20 percent of the carrier to investors while hanging onto the rest, a situation that would get the underperforming unit's financials off DT's books. Ultimately, whatever comes of this probably won't happen for a few months while the options get mulled, but considering what went down in the UK, this certainly seems plausible.
Tesla Motors CEO 'does not devote his full time and attention to Tesla'
We've already discussed the seemingly suicidal situation Tesla finds itself in with relation to its 2011 Roadster production cessation, but that SEC submission for the company's IPO is a long, long affair (which you may read below), and there were more nuggets of madness to be found. Apparently, CEO Elon Musk is a busy man -- with CEO and CTO functions at SpaceX and a chairmanship at SolarCity to attend to -- and so he couldn't possibly be expected to focus his full attention on ensuring that the half billion dollar state loan his company received gets spent as wisely as possible. Add Musk's corporate bigamy to an expectation of "continuing losses" and dwindling waiting lists and you have to wonder who, other than the US government, will be buying shares when this offering goes public.
Tesla Motors IPO coming 'any day' now, says report
Word on the street -- and by that we mean Reuters -- is that Tesla's looking to go public with the company "any day." The luxury electric car make, whose Roadster still goes for a cool $109,000, would be the first US auto company to offer an IPO since Ford way back in 1956, says MSNBC. Quite a notable event, indeed, but earlier comments by Tesla investors (via Autoblog Green) suggest "any day now" might be any time between now and September 2010.
Over 80 billion ISK embezzled from player-run bank in EVE Online
The player-driven economy of EVE Online is a major draw for gamers interested in virtual finance, although for very different reasons; some players enjoy managing vast funds in the game, others are primarily in it for a shot at a major heist. Sometimes, even those who start out with the best intentions succumb to temptation. Regardless of the motivations one has to build up (or tear down) something in the game, left up to their own devices, some EVE players aren't simply content with the existing game mechanics when it comes to financial instruments. As such, they've established their own banks, IPOs, and other types of investments. The more reputable banks and funds have built-in safeguards that limit any one employee's access to the deposited ISK, as -- let's face it -- this is EVE and such contingencies are necessary. More than a few players eye that cache of billions of raw ISK, Blueprint Originals, and other assets, and simply want to pull a runner. This has been the case just this week, with the player-run Dynasty Banking, which was apparently taken for billions of ISK by Xabier, the former Dynasty Investments Manager who had access to funds invested by EVE's playerbase.
Danger files for $100M IPO
One of the more important privately held companies operating in the consumer wireless industry today, Danger has filed this week to go public with the SEC "as soon as practicable" in an effort to raise up to $100 million in cold, hard cash under the symbol "DNGR." The SEC filing is a gold mine of information peeping into the inner workings of the outfit, revealing that Danger is "substantially dependent" on T-Mobile for its revenue stream (surprise, surprise) and that while overall revenue has grown from $36.7 to $49.3 to $56.4 million in the past three years, losses have actually widened over the past two from $8 million in 2006 to $11.7 million this year. Of course, it costs money to make money -- Danger clearly knows that -- and they intend to use $7.2 million of the IPO's proceeds to pay back some loans, hopefully on the path to eventual profit. No word yet on exactly when the IPO will go down or how many shares will be outstanding.[Via mocoNews]
Lawsuit claims Virgin Mobile told a little lie to boost IPO showing
Virgin Mobile's October IPO raked in a solid $412.5 million -- a little bit off its highest estimate, yeah, but still boatloads (and when we say "boatloads," we mean "hundreds of millions of dollars") higher than what it had thought it could get when it first announced its intentions to go public. A new class action suit alleges that the $412.5M figure was inflated, though, by Virgin's fudging of third quarter revenue figures which conveniently have since been revised down to indicate a $7.3M loss. Unfortunate coincidence? Maybe, but Virgin's stock fell a solid 14.4 percent on news of the redone numbers, so we can understand that a few shareholders might be grumbling about the sitch. Meanwhile, the MVNO's form letter reaction to the news is in full effect, claiming that the lawsuit is "completely without merit," so we're guessing this one's gonna be tied up in the legal system for a hot minute or two.
