Hi5, the social network that’s popular in Latin America and other parts of the world, has raised $15 million in venture debt from Hercules Technology Growth Capital.
This is a small amount compared to larger rival Facebook’s $240 million strategic investment from Microsoft last fall, although Hi5 did just raise $20 million in July (our coverage).
San Francisco-based Hi5 is apparently looking to build out country-specific features, as it faces increased competition from Myspace, Facebook and local social networks. It has been working on a developer platform, that includes an already-available application from music service iLike (our coverage). It is also part of Google’s Open Social initiative, which is designed to let third party developers easily place their applications on multiple social networks.
Tags: co:hi5, inv:Hercules-Technology-Growth-Capital2 Comments
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Happy said:
Debt, debt, debt. Good luck Hi5!
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Steven said:
This is a pretty interesting deal and I wonder whi Mohr would allow hi5 to take on senior debt literally months after they put in $20M.
I dont view it as a positive sign that the company took in so much money in the form of debt so quicky after equity.
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4:45 pm
VentureBeat » Web companies raising lots of money, to make themselves recession-proof said:
[...] amount from European entrepreneurs the Samwer brothers in January. Hi5, as well, just raised another $15 million in venture debt on top of a $20 million round last summer. Meanwhile, Bebo hired a bank last fall, [...]
10:58 am
Web companies raising lots of money, to make themselves recession-proof | Lovegin’s Personal weblog said:
[...] amount from European entrepreneurs the Samwer brothers in January. Hi5, as well, just raised another $15 million in venture debt on top of a $20 million round last summer. Meanwhile, Bebo hired a bank last fall, [...]