Huffington Post and aQuantive? |
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Huffington Post and aQuantive?
The massive $25 million investment that Oak Investment Partners is pumping into online news site Huffington Post today comes at a time when traditional media companies are firing reporters, closing bureaus and reducing the size of their publications.
That alone is interesting. But what caught my eye in Kara Swisher's report this morning were remarks from Oak's Fred Harman, who drew some parallels between the investment in Huffington Post and his firm's backing of Seattle-based aQuantive.
Harman tells All Things Digital that his firm continued to invest in aQuantive even though economic times were tough.
“Who knows how deep this economic situation is going to be. But strong companies that keep investing through a bad cycle can emerge as winners,” he said.
That certainly turned out to be the case for aQuantive, which sold to Microsoft for $6 billion last year. Oak's $25 million bet is a big one that Huffington Post can help transform journalism in this country.
But the venture firm is known for big bets. In the Seattle area, the firm has backed a number of companies over the past 15 years: Primus Knowledge, Internap, Radiant Research, Qpass, SnapIn, Talisma and Tegic Communications.
What is interesting about that list is that every one of the companies has either been sold of completed an IPO. With $25 million in the bank and an estimated valuation of just under $100 million, could Huffington Post be the next successful exit for Oak?
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