Today at Business Insider’s Ignition conference in New York, David Lee, founder and managing partner at SV Angel, had a few things to say about Foursquare. Because SV Angel is an investor, they were good things.
“Foursquare is one of the most misunderstood companies,” he said. At 43, Lee isn’t using Foursquare to check in. He uses it in a passive way to find new restaurants, and he said he finds the app very powerful. It goes further than the simple check-in mechanism.
Other participants on the panel agreed. Bijan Sabet, general partner at Spark Capital, said that “Foursquare could be one of the most valuable mobile companies,” as it is one of the early players in the mobile, local, social space. Spark Capital invested in Foursquare.
“Foursquare has been a product only for the creators and curators for four years now,” said David Tisch, angel investor at BoxGroup. According to him, Foursquare is just changing and trying to target the 95 percent of users who don’t create content.
In early November, we reported that Foursquare had been taking VC meetings in order to raise a Series D round of funding between $50 million and $100 million. Agreeing on valuation is harder than the company expected.
Today’s vote of confidence is painting a better picture for the company that is trying to reinvent itself as a Yelp competitor. With 25 million registered users and a recent redesign, Foursquare has a strong mobile product and a talented team.
Foursquare is a geographical location based social network that incorporates gaming elements. Users share their location with friends by “checking in” via a smartphone app or by text message. Points are awarded for checking in at various venues. Users can connect their Foursquare accounts to their Twitter and Facebook accounts, which can update when a check in is registered. By checking in a certain number of times, or in different locations, users can collect virtual badges. In addition, users...
Austin, TX
Seattle, WA
San Diego, CA
Menlo Park, CA
Boston, MA
Disrupt Europe: Berlin Hackathon
Berlin, Germany
