• Brainspark buys 30% stake in Italian Loopt competitor Mobnotes

    Steve O'Hear

    Steve O’Hear is probably best known as a technology journalist, currently at TechCrunch where he focuses mainly on European startups, companies and products. He was previously co-founder and CEO of expertise platform Beepl where he helped the company navigate its first VC round, along with seeing the product through development, private alpha and a high profile public launch. In November... → Learn More

    Monday, March 7th, 2011

    The AIM-listed investment company Brainspark has acquired a 30% stake in the Italian location-based social network Mobnotes. The deal will see Brainspark hand over €600k equally split between cash and stock.

    Similar to Loopt and other location-based social networks, Mobnotes (‘mobile notes’) lets users locate nearby friends, shops and restaurants etc. and send location notifications. It has mobile apps for iPhone, Nokia (Symbian), Android and Vodafone 360 as well as a generic mobile site, and claims 150,000 registered users in Italy, “working in conjunction with the major mobile handset manufacturers and networks.”

    It terms of revenue stream, Mobnotes utilises mobile advertising as well as offering custom co-branded versions of the service. It says it expects revenues of €590,000 in 2011, which is expected to rise to over €2.5 million by 2012, and says it should become profitable in 2012.

    In 2008, the company was a TechCrunch50 finalist.