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"Besides the huge piles of investment dough being poured into [these companies], here’s what else [they] have in common: Little to no revenue. That does not se
by cs702 13y ago
"Besides the huge piles of investment dough being poured into [these companies], here’s what else [they] have in common: Little to no revenue. That does not seem to have stopped a panoply of venture and other investors from jumping in and ponying up with huge amounts of cash for the privilege of investing in several fast-growing startups, hoping to grab ahold of the next Twitter or Facebook early."
I don't know anything about Snapchat's internal operations or plans, and therefore can't really judge whether the company will eventually figure out how to make enough money from its self-destructing messages to warrant a $3.5 billion valuation today. What I DO know is that whenever investors start "jumping in and ponying up with huge amounts of cash for the privilege of investing" (in new companies with no revenues), there's a good chance that valuations are getting too optimistic -- and that never ends well.
Maybe this time things really are different, but it's hard for me not to see some parallels with the "dot-com bubble" of the late 1990's.[1]
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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble
- nemothekid 13y agoAre there any examples of any other companies other than snapchat that are raising a huge amount of money with little to revenue, or revenue potential? While its important we don't repeat the mistakes of the past, I'm hesitant to claim that all of Silicon Valley will burn to the ground because solely SnapChat was a bad investment.
- xgarland 13y agoEver heard of Pinterest? They definitely fall into that category of companies with little to no revenue, but have a massive valuation. Here's the thing: While users may not be paying with their dollars just yet, almost all of them are paying with their time. So, it's not completely absurd that certain companies are able to attract such capital if investors continue to recognize huge potential in the long run.
- brandoncapecci 13y agoDo we have any engagement numbers on Snapchat? The deal with Pinterest is that most of their users also have some intent to purchase a lot of their pins. They also have a ton of data for precisely targeted adverts. I'm not even sure about the options Snapchat has for for monetization.
- jmathai 13y agoThe only thing Pintrest and Snapchat have in common is that they haven't started trying to monetize yet. Pintrest has about a gazillion ways it can monetize. I'm really anxious to see how they do it. Just today while driving in the car my wife said "Cool, I just got a [push] notification from Pintrest that a fabric I pinned at JoAnne Fabrics is on sale". Pintrest is a gold mine and my guess is that they've got a rosey future that doesn't end in acquisition. Snapchat has an engaged audience. I can't imagine how they'll really monetize their user base in a meaningful way. But they're a really attractive acquisition opportunity for a bunch of companies. Obviously investors might be more bullish on Snapchat's revenue generating opportunities...