BuzzFeed is set to embark on a period of rapid growth centred on investment in video and acquisitions following a fifth major institutional backing.
The business, which was set up by Huffington Post co-founder Jonah Peretti in 2006, provides social news and entertainment-related content – driven through social media interaction.
New investor Andreessen Horowitz has stepped in as a new backer, with the firm also counting the likes of Pinterest, Foursquare, Twitter and Airbnb as portfolio companies.
Andreessen Horowitz general partner Chris Dixon, who is joining the BuzzFeed board alongside president and COO Jon Steinberg and executive chairman Kenneth Lerer, says that the venture capital firm views BuzzFeed as a ‘full stack start-up’.
‘BuzzFeed is a media company in these same sense that Tesla is a car company, Uber is a taxi company or Netflix is a streaming movie company. We believe we’re in the “deployment” phase of the internet. The foundation has now been laid.
‘As a small, early investor in BuzzFeed, I got to observe firsthand how effectively Jonah and the team executed in recent years. The results speak for themselves: BuzzFeed now reaches over 150 million people per month, is consistently profitable, and will generate ripple digit millions in revenues this year.’
New York-based BuzzFeed used its last investment deal, $19.3 million in January 2013, to target overseas expansion in regions including the UK. Alongside Britain, BuzzFeed pushed forward in Australia, India, Germany and Japan.
BuzzFeed’s other funding deals saw the company raise $15.5 million in January 2012, $8 million in May 2010 and $3.5 million in July 2008.
Explaining where BuzzFeed will now look to develop, Dixon adds, ‘It now has an editorial staff of over 200 people covering a wide range of topics – politics, sports, business, entertainment, travel, etc – and plans to invest significantly more in high-quality content in the coming years.’
