Venture capital has a diversity problem . BLCK VC , a new organization founded by Storm Ventures associate Frederik Groce and NEA associate Sydney Sykes to connect, engage and advance black venture capitalists, is ready for a new era in the industry. Their mission: Turn 200 black investors into 400 black investors by 2024. “We think of ourselves as an organization formed by black VCs for blacks VCs to increase the representation of black investors,” Sykes told TechCrunch. “You can look around and say well ‘I know five black VCs,’ but you can also say this firm does not have a single black VC, they may not even have a single underrepresented minority … We want to make firms reckon with the fact that there is a racial diversity problem; there is a lack of black VCs and every firm should really care about it.” BLCK VC has been at work since the beginning of 2018, building and expanding a network of black investors in the San Francisco area, Los Angeles and New York. They seek to provide a...
IAC is changing the way its business is organized, the company reported during its Q3 2018 earnings on Wednesday. The company’s video platform Vimeo and DotDash (previously About.com) will become their own separate segments at IAC starting in Q4. That means they’ve reached the point their revenues can stand on their own.
The company beat on third quarter revenue expectations in the quarter with a revenue increase to $1.1 billion from $828.4 million a year ago, ahead of FactSet analyst expectations of $1.07 billion. However, net income was $145.8 million, or $1.49 a share, down from $179.6 million, or $1.79 a share, a year earlier. The drop was attributed to a tax benefit that it received in the year-ago period.
Vimeo’s revenue growth in the quarter increased 29 percent, and it grew its subscriber base by 10 percent to 932,000, IAC said.
“The business has the scale and potential to now stand on its own, and we want to begin to put a spotlight on it,” said IAC CEO Joey Levin, in a note to shareholders.
“Vimeo always has and always will obsessively, relentlessly cater to the needs of creators – not advertisers, not eyeballs, not our own platform, nor anything else. We’ve focused entirely on the creators and they have rewarded Vimeo with their loyalty. The numbers bear this out – Vimeo enjoys incredible retention, an average customer lifetime of nearly 5 years, customers that upgrade over time, and new subscribers that are attracted to fresh, premium offerings at increasingly higher price points,” he wrote.
Meanwhile, DotDash increased revenue by 35 percent to reach $30.1 million, with expanding profit margins in Q3.
The company will also begin splitting out mobile revenue from its legacy desktop business in Q4. IAC said its mobile business saw 158 percent revenue growth in the quarter to over $35 million, comprising 23 percent of its total revenue. The mobile business now counts over 2.5 million subscribers, IAC said.
After the changes to business segments in Q4, the remaining businesses in Publishing and Video will aggregate into a catch-all segment, named “Emerging & Other” which will include both early stage and mature businesses like BlueCrew, Ask Media Group, The Daily Beast, DROPOUT (College Humor’s subscription service), IAC Films and new incubation projects.
The group may “intermittently generate cash or consume cash,” but is more focused on the “next decade than the next quarter,” warned IAC. It noted it wouldn’t communicate much about the segment’s businesses going forward.
In addition, the company announced a new acquisition: East coast-based TelTech, the makers of an app called Robokiller, which blocks spam calls and telemarketers. This will join IAC’s Applications group.
Combined with Publishing (where DotDash, Ask.com, Investopedia, The Daily Beast, and others live) the two segments delivered over $50 million of Adjusted EBITDA in the quarter, nearly all of it cash flow.
Match Group, the parent company to Tinder, grew its average subscribers 23 percent to 8.1 million, driven by 61 percent growth in Tinder average subscribers to 4.1 million. Match had reported its own earnings ahead of IAC this week, where it also announced plans to focus Tinder on casual dating and invest more heavily in the relationship-focused app Hinge.
Match also announced a special $2 per share dividend, of which IAC said it has “no one thing or single use” in mind.
IAC said it’s now stockpiling cash and should have over $1.7 billion by year-end, excluding ANGI Homeservices (Angie’s List, HomeAdvisor, Handy – whose acquisition now completed – and others) and Match Group cash.
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