Mobli has just acquired Los Angeles-based Pheed, no financial details were officially disclosed, but several media outlets haved reported the deal is in the neighborhood of $40M. Pheed, a social networking app, had about five million users and Mobli said it will invest $10 million to remake it, while keeping the app independent.
“Content monetization is a continuous challenge,” said Moshe Hogeg, founder and CEO of Mobli, in a statement. “We are passionate about giving our users possibilities to monetize their content and Pheed has taken strides in this direction. We are excited for the future of Pheed as a part of the Mobli family.”
Part of Pheed’s monetization efforts include paid ‘Pheed channels.’ Users can charge other users a premium or a pay-per-view fee for access to broadcasts of their live events. Subscription fees vary between $1.99 and $34.99 and Pheed takes a cut of the revenue. Pheed also allows users to share audio with each other, music, video, photos and text. Unliked Facebook and Twitter, Pheed is mobile only. To date, Pheed has raised $4.5 million.
Pheed first launched for iOS in November of 2012 and by February of 2013 it had become the number free social networking app in Apple’s App store. The company was lifted up by some media outlets as ‘The #1 Social Network to Watch in 2013’(Forbes) and ‘the social media company of the year’ (Business Insider). It was also noted for celebrity early adopters including Miley Cyrus and Nas.
Mobli is a Tel Aviv-based photo and video-sharing app. It has been called an Instagram competitor and in late 2013 received a $60 million investment from Mexico billionaire Carlos Slim. The company has raised $86 million in total. In addition to Instagram-like features it has a live video broadcasting feature and direct messaging. Early on, Mobli also had celebrity involvement, including investments from Tobey Maguire, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Serena Williams.
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