Personal profile startup About.me launched publicly, oh, all of four days ago. And, boom. Today AOL (our parent company), will announce that they’ve acquired the company. It will become part of the consumer applications group, led by AOL exec Brad Garlinghouse.
Making About.Me a sister company to TechCrunch.
Frankly I’m a little surprised by the acquisition.
Not because About.me isn’t a potentially fascinating product. They had 400,000 people sign up for the service during the short beta period that began in September. Despite the simplicity of the service there’s something compelling about it.
And not because it’s not a good fit. Cofounder and CEO Tony Conrad sold his last company, Sphere, to AOL as well. And Conrad was an investor in Oddpost, which Garlinghouse acquired earlier this decade to revamp Yahoo mail. AOL seems to be genuinely excited about getting the About.me team on board and finding ways to integrate it into their mail and instant messaging products.
But frankly it’s just too soon to take About.me off the market. Conrad has had multiple wins as an entrepreneur and is more than financially secure. and I’m surprised he didn’t wait to see this one through a bit.
Still, it’s a big win for employees and investors, including cofounders Tim Young and Ryan Freitas. About.me raised just $425,000 from investors including AOL Ventures and True Ventures. The size of the acquisition isn’t being disclosed but our guess is it’s in the tens of millions of dollars.
This is also the best news in world for competitor flavors.me, which has a similar product. Other buyers will likely be taking a long look at them shortly.
I had a chance to sit down with Conrad for a few minutes to talk about the deal. We’re long time friends, so excuse the mutual ribbing. And don’t miss the outtakes at the end where Conrad demands a bottle of Badoit (the cadillac of mineral waters, I guess), and complains when he gets generic Costco water. He also tells us the real price for About.me. Video is top of post.
Read Tony Conrad’s blog post on the acquisition here.
about.me (PumpkinHead) was founded by Tony Conrad, Ryan Freitas and Tim Young in December 2009. One year later, about.me was acquired by AOL. about.me’s simple focus enables you to a) create a personal profile page (think splash page) that points users to your content around the web and b) understand how many people see your profile, where they’re coming from and what they do on your page. There’s a good chance you have multiple on-line profiles scattered across various...
AOL is a global advertising-supported Web company, with display advertising network in the U.S., a substantial worldwide audience, and a suite of popular Web brands and products. The company’s strategy focuses on increasing the scale and sophistication of its advertising platform and growing the size and engagement of its global online audience through leading products and programming. On March 13, 2008, AOL Internet division announced their plans to buy social network Bebo for $850 million in cash. History of Aol: AOL was...
Tony Conrad is Co-Founder & CEO of about.me (acquired by Aol in December 2010). He is also a Founding Venture Partner at True Ventures where he serves on the Board of Directors of Automattic (WordPress), appssavvy, Coffee & Power, Quarterly, StockTwits, RescueTime, PastFuture (GDGT), KISSmetrics, 20x200, Smarterer, CatchFREE and led True’s investment in MakerBot, Trippy, ToyTalk, Betable and OnTheAir. Previously, Tony was Co-Founder & CEO Sphere which was acquired by AOL in April, 2008. In addition, Tony has...
Providing the creative vision for Socialcast and its technology, Timothy brings nearly a decade of web development experience and over 8 years of entrepreneurship to the company. Tim, along with Tony Conrad and Ryan Freitas, is the Co-Founder of about.me, a site that helps bring one’s disparate profiles on services like Facebook and LinkedIn together in a single on-line identity. On December 20, 2010, four days after about.me’s public launch, AOL announced that it would be acquiring the company. Young...
Ryan Freitas is the Co-Founder of about.me, along with Tony Conrad and Tim Young. Ryan has enthusiastically pursued the opportunity to work on emerging user experience principles, and he has a strong interest in informatics, empathic design, and democratizing access to technology. He lives in San Francisco with his wife Kristen.
Brad Garlinghouse joined YouSendIt in May 2012, and manages the company’s core operations, business growth strategy and key partnerships. Brad believes that a truly successful company begins with its employees and the culture they build together as a team. Brad is focused on creating a winning culture at YouSendIt by constantly challenging the way people think and how they approach their day-to-day roles at the company. Prior to coming to YouSendIt, Brad was President of Consumer Applications and head of AOL’s...
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