Following an investment by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, disappearing messaging app Snapchat now sports an eye-popping valuation of $10 billion.
While previous reports suggested that Alibaba was considering an investment, The Wall Street Journal alleges that the Chinese tech titan ultimately passed. Kleiner, however, tendered $20 million in May -- which would amount to a stake in Snapchat of less than 1 percent.
The funding round has not yet closed and a Snapchat spokeswoman bristled at the reports. "The valuation of our business and our capital requirements are the least exciting aspects of supporting the Snapchat community,” she told the Journal in a statement. “We have no further comment at this time."
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As of its last funding round in December 2013, Snapchat had raised a total of $163 million.
It is possible that incoming capital could be allocated towards Snapchat Discovery, a forthcoming service that would disseminate ephemeral news content and ads, marking the company’s first play towards monetization.
Despite the fact that Snapchat is virtually unprofitable, the company says that more than 100 million monthly users send roughly 700 million disappearing “snaps” every day.
Its latest funding round now catapults it to the valuation stratosphere alongside startups like Airbnb, Dropbox ($10 billion each) and Uber ($18.2 billion).
