Hong Kong Billionaire Ups Facebook Stake

Dan Frommer | March 27, 2008 4:00 PM

Hong Kong mobile tycoon Li Ka-shing has invested another $40+ million in Facebook, upping his stake in Mark Zuckerberg's social networking site to more than $100 million, MarketWatch reports. Li previously invested $60 million for a 0.4% stake of Facebook.

We haven't heard otherwise, so we think it's safe to assume his more recent investment was at the same $15 billion valuation.

To recap -- here's who else thinks Facebook is worth $15 billion:

German Internet entrepreneurs the Samwer brothers
Microsoft (MSFT)

Anyone else?

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22 Comments

G (URL) said:

Mar. 27, 4:28 PM

Not me, not sure if its got to do with my age group (27-32) but we're all a bunch of geeks, and we all hate facebook, recently turned into spam book with all the useless apps.

Is it worth $15bn ? I'd like to know what's their CPM, and if people are actually clicking on those ads, they still suck. Its value is probably within all the data you can mine and then sell to big brother.

However... everyone has a facebook account, that's pretty valuable.

The billionaire should invest instead in Mybloop.com, offering something substantial, unlimted free file storage with functionality and social aspects around the files.

You can pretty much sell advertisement about any thing that revolves around the content shared on the site.

Dan Frommer said:

Mar. 27, 4:31 PM

@"Steve Ballmer" Deleted your comment. Please do not use that nickname on our site. Also, no f-bombs.

Alley-G said:

Mar. 27, 4:53 PM

I think Li Ka-Shing is a smart business man, but how does the investment worth the pay off remain to be seen. I think Facebook needs to figure out a business module ASAP, or perhaps buy one. Maybe AOL can somehow fit into that picture??

togilvie said:

Mar. 27, 5:04 PM

What's the valuation for new employees (e.g. Sheryl Sandberg) on their options? Can they actually recruit people at this valuation, or is there an "inside number" that employees get?

That's the only number that really matters vis a vis valuation. All these other investors presumably have participating preferred, so they're backstopped on losing money unless it's a catastrophe.

jenkins said:

Mar. 27, 8:36 PM

Honestly don't get this move at all. Facebook will get smaller (in value) over the next 18 months, not larger.

Sramana Mitra (URL) said:

Mar. 27, 9:33 PM

Ka-Shing should have read this:
http://sramanamitra.com/2008/02/05/deal-radar-2008-facebook-woes-coming/

rizchamps said:

Mar. 28, 3:23 AM

$60M is just pet money for Li, and it seems to be consistent with his investment style. His acquisition of wealth can be simplified to one thing "traffic". He made his money in real estate, ports, transportation and retail - which all include two layers of value - the tangible assets themselves and the traffic it generates. He earns returns by running a business on top of assets that appreciates over time.

And it seems that he believe that FB will be the same - it is proved to have traffic, and he might believe that that property will appreciate - by hoping that it would be sold to Goog, MS, or the public in the near future.

Rob Bell (URL) said:

Mar. 28, 2:02 PM

I agree with the earlier posters - Facebook has become a headache to use because of all the apps.

Whereas my friends and I used it to stay in touch and plan things 12 months ago, it's become a bit of a pain to use now, and I'm not spending 10% of the time on there I used to.

One would think numbers would be going down due to the increasingly negative user experience, but I imagine the growth will continue as they develop localised content for different countries, and as Li says, converge media platforms - mobile content for example.

I have to say that I love the fact that a billionaire is called Ka-shing - the sound that cash tills used to make!

John McLaughlin (URL) said:

Mar. 28, 4:39 PM

Share the wealth Facebook offers.

When you're hot everyone wants a piece of the action

John McLaughlin, Day Traders - Consultant / Coach
www.DayTradersWin.com

ron lyre (URL) said:

Mar. 29, 5:34 PM

Whoops. Bad move Mr Ker-ching (closes till)! Sorry Ka-shing. Even I can feel it in my bones. Facebook is on its way out and why...because in the end everyone gets bored with it. All those apps - a sign of desperation if ever I saw one. Facebook is a novelty and novelties don't last.If you want anymore advice Mr K just email me.

Mitch (URL) said:

Mar. 31, 2:41 AM

I could believe it's worth a lot, but $15 billion does seem way out of place. Then again, being someone who believes in positive thinking, if there's at least one person out there who believes it's worth that much, then obviously it's worth that much, and I hope the kid gets everything that someone is willing to pay him.

As to the apps,... now that they've added the thing where you can block apps and requests forever with just the click of the mouse, I can tolerate the first time intrusion.

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