Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 38 posts

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#11

Post by zacharyz »

"The start-up, which has no revenue to speak of yet"

This is the aspect of the site that always made me scratch my head and say "huh?"

It is no doubt a well designed site that engages women. Despite being in beta and invite only I know a bunch of women who are really into it. I don't think being engaging is enough though - where do they go from here? How do they actually justify the valuation? Are they going to have "paid" posts for advertising? Are they going to some how sell the data mined from their users? Paid accounts?

This site seems like it is going to be even harder to monetize than reddit.

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#14

Post by diolpah »

zacharyz wrote: post #11

"The start-up, which has no revenue to speak of yet" This is the aspect of the site that always made me scratch my head and say "huh?" It is no doubt a well designed site that engages women. Despite being in beta and invite only I know a bunch of women who are really into it. I don't think being engaging is enough though - where do they go from here? How do they actually justify the valuation? Are they going to have…

I'll take a wild guess, predicated on the fact that twitter is another social platform that's difficult to monetize: sponsored pinboards.

My company would pay to have "sponsored pinboards" all day long if the net ROI was positive. But that's a huge "if".

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#15

Post by KevinEldon »

zacharyz wrote: post #11

"The start-up, which has no revenue to speak of yet" This is the aspect of the site that always made me scratch my head and say "huh?" It is no doubt a well designed site that engages women. Despite being in beta and invite only I know a bunch of women who are really into it. I don't think being engaging is enough though - where do they go from here? How do they actually justify the valuation? Are they going to have…

I can vouch for the engages women... Pinterest has the secret sauce. My wife and her friends absolutely love it and get a lot of value and inspiration from the photos and links.

At first glance my thought was that it would be an amazing advertising platform. Mix in the user generated pinned photos with high quality targeted photos of products women are interested in buying and you've got some potential magic.

Again, using my wife as a reference, she's taken several ideas she's picked up on Pinterest and applied them to recipes, decorations, clothing, house design ideas (we're in the early stages of designing our new home), and travel ideas. She's not one to jump on the latest thing, so it surprised me how effectively Pinterest hooked her.

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#16

Post by adient »

angelbob wrote: post #9

If they raised $25 million while valued at $200 million, and earlier raised $10 million, presumably at a much lower valuation... That doesn't leave the company a huge amount of equity and control, does it?

It was $10 million based on $40 million valuation. Combined with the latest investment, it seems a majority percentage of equity would still belong to the founders. Well past successful at a $200 million valuation, for sure.

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#17

Post by rokhayakebe »

callmeed wrote: post #2

I have not seen my wife so engaged with a site or mobile app since Facebook and possibly Angry Birds. That's when I knew Pinterest was going to be huge. Good for them on raising this round. I think the path to monetization will be a no-brainer as well. Contrast that with the folks as Svpply (I heard hopes for them for early on) who sit around saying "They’ve (pinterest) locked themselves into a niche community of 22-…

I am a dude. Pinterest gets me in touch with both my creative, and apparently now, feminine side. I like it so much I decide I will build another site around it this weekend.

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#18

Post by rokhayakebe »

natgordon wrote: post #8
callmeed wrote: post #2

I have not seen my wife so engaged with a site or mobile app since Facebook and possibly Angry Birds. That's when I knew Pinterest was going to be huge. Good for them on raising this round. I think the path to monetization will be a no-brainer as well. Contrast that with the folks as Svpply (I heard hopes for them for early on) who sit around saying "They’ve (pinterest) locked themselves into a niche community of 22-…

From the article you posted from by Svpply blog: "It’s going to be very difficult for them to grow beyond puppies and photos of Ryan Gosling." Wow. What a complete disregard for women as a desirable demographic. When companies act like this it's an opportunity for the rest of us. I've been using pinterest the same way I use twitter; as social media for my business (whose target demographic is women 22-35).

as social media for my business

I wish I could say "OMG", but HN wouldn't allow me. This is exactly what I was afraid of when I found Pinterest: marketers. This is the start of a decline.

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#19

Post by rokhayakebe »

rgrieselhuber wrote: post #13

I remember meeting Ben in Palo Alto last year when he was still figuring things out and trying to raise money. Sounds like it's been amazing year since then. Congrats guys. :-)

when he was still figuring things out

I would like to hear a bit more about this. Did they start with a different product or idea?

Re: Pinterest raises $27 million in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz

#20

Post by rgrieselhuber »

rokhayakebe wrote: post #19
rgrieselhuber wrote: post #13

I remember meeting Ben in Palo Alto last year when he was still figuring things out and trying to raise money. Sounds like it's been amazing year since then. Congrats guys. :-)

when he was still figuring things out I would like to hear a bit more about this. Did they start with a different product or idea?

No, it was the Pinterest you see today but I think they only had a core user group and were figuring out how to make it grow from there.
Post reply on HN