After years of saying they were not going to sell, the Facebook IPO is happening today.
According to the Times “Facebook will make one of the most ambitious stockmarket debuts in history today after valuing the networking site at over $100 billion”. It certainly is a happy Friday for many as Mark Zuckerberg will become a multibillionaire and 1,000 employees (past and present) will be millionaires once the launch takes place on the NY Nasdaq at lunch time. Mr Zuckerberg will become the 23rd richest person in the world – quite impressive for a Harvard drop out.
Last night the Facebook share price was set at $38 USD valuing the company at $104 billion. But is the company really worth this much? Will Facebook continue to grow as fast it has done over the past 5 years? Facebook made $3.7 billion in revenue last year and $1 billion in profit. But will the advertising revenue increase or have we seen a peak of the activity. Is there a Facebook bubble and will it burst like FriendsReunited?
The IPO will affect users, there will be even more changes to personal profiles, (I just got an update today), privacy settings will be changed and potentially the way Facebook is being used will alter in the future. The social networking site already acts like a business tool, delivering targeted adverts to its users (who often are not interested). The cash raised from the IPO will be used to buy rival companies and build new products.
It will be interesting to see how the future of Future of Facebook pans out from today, it is history in the making.