Friendster: The Orkut of Asia
by John Paczkowski
Posted on August 5, 2008 at 2:01 PM PT
Tell me why you aren’t going to be the next Friendster.”
– Venture capitalist David L. Sze’s 2006 litmus test for entrepreneurs who claimed to have the next MySpace.
If Orkut is the Facebook of Brazil, then Friendster is the Orkut of Asia. The company, which created the social- networking market only to forfeit it to Myspace and Facebook, is apparently doing quite well in Asia. So much so, that it’s used its success on that continent to secure some new venture funding and a CEO with a Google (GOOG) pedigree. In a statement proclaiming itself the No. 1 social network in Asia this morning, Friendster named Richard Kimber, Google’s Managing Director of Sales and Operations for South East Asia, as CEO. The company also said it has raised $20 million in new venture funding from DG Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Benchmark Capital, DAG Ventures, and the Founders Fund. Friendster plans to use that money to hire up and bolster its presence across Asia, specifically Singapore, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia.
Perhaps, we’ll see that Friendster movie yet–though I still can’t imagine a worse concept.
Comments
friendster would have been the orkut of orkut if kleiner perkins and sequoia capital hadn’t convinced the founder NOT to see to Google, pre-IPO… both john doerr and michael moritz thought friendster would be worth more and could possibly ipo back in 2003/04. those were the days when freinster was the ‘myspace’ of the day, with everyone using it, from college students to presidential candidates… so how valuable was kpcb and sequoia capital’s ‘advice’ and ‘relationships’ and keiretsu? not very. and founder jon abrams is now watching as friendster now must try and find a niche somewhere — anywhere — now that doerr and moritz messed it up
Posted by Sam Harrison at August 5th, 2008 at 3:03 pmshould read “not to sell to Google”
Posted by Sam Harrison at August 5th, 2008 at 3:04 pm