Cuban May Be Right about YouTube-Google
Mark Cuban may have missed the mark when he refused to believe Google would buy YouTube but now that the deal's getting done, his unorthodox stance on the $1.65-billion marriage shouldn't be ignored. His post today - somewhat hard to find amid the blogosphere tsunami unleashed yesterday - raises an excellent point: with YouTube poised to become of the Google empire (and bidding a champagne-drenched farewell to its status as a scrappy, peoples' champion start-up) how long will it take before Google's major rivals (e.g. Fox, which owns MySpace, which also delivers a lot of video) unleash their legal hounds on YouTube? After all, Google will be a major player in the video business so why would content owners let it use unlicensed material to support the YouTube's growth. The other side of the coin is Google may be content to deal with any content issues if that's what it takes to own the world's biggest online video brand. Two other points before you go onto to read everything you ever wanted to know about YouTube: 1. YouTube was started in 20 months ago; it raised its first round of VC last November, and talked about an IPO a few months ago. It's been a wonderful, wild ride from Chad Hurley and Steven Chen; and 2. Sequoia Capital, which also had a major stake in Google, could see its $11.5-million investment in YouTube be worth as much as $500-million. Sweet.
Update: Nice to see the New York Times has finally caught up to me - :) - with a story about how Sequoia was the only VC to back YouTube. It is interesting that Sequoia was able to corner the deal, particularly when YouTube raised a second round after it had gained some serious traction.
Written by Mark Evans on October 10th, 2006 with no comments.
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