MySpace-for-grown-ups: LinkedIn Could Become a Multibillion-dollar Biz
PayPal alum Reid Hoffman's
LinkedIn, a
three-year-old online business networking company, is at a tipping point,
writes Business 2.0 in a detailed profile of the service - you're either
LinkedIn or left out.
Capitalizing on the Web 2.0 boom, the privately held company has about 8 million members and claims to be profitable and expects to hit $100 million in revenue by 2008.
Sequoia Capital and Greylock invested nearly $15 million in the company, which launched in 2003. LinkedIn had passed 500,000 members the first year and hit 4.4 million by 2005. There are nearly 4 million LinkedIn members outside the United States. Hoffman thinks LinkedIn could become a multibillion-dollar business, bigger than Facebook.
LinkedIn is all about business: recruiting, sales, investment. Recruiters account for 10% of the membership - a Microsoft recruiter is directly connected to 3,500 people, while a San Jose-based recruiter claims more than 28,000 connections. In the meantime, LinkedIn has become the go-to place for the tech elite.
Hoffman has angel invested in more than 40 startups, including Digg, Facebook, and Six Apart.
LinkedIn competition comes from: Spoke, Ryze, Hoover’s Connect, ...
