14 DAY TRIAL // Despite a new-found wave of enthusiasm at MySpace, the social network's decline shows no sign of stopping anytime soon. News Corp., MySpace's parent company, isn't doing great financially either, so rumors that the companies are looking to get rid of Photobucket, the popular photo-sharing site acquired by MySpace in 2007, sound pretty solid. The buyer is apparently Ontela, a startup that enables users to upload the photos from their camera phones to their PC or a number of photo-hosting sites.
All companies involved are staying quiet but, according to TechCrunch, Ontela is set to buy a majority stake in Photobucket and will likely integrate the photo-hosting site with its services. MySpace, or rather News Corp., acquired Photobucket two years ago for $250 million in a deal that made sense at the time as the photo-hosting site was serving a great deal of the media content on MySpace. The site was also flying high in terms of traffic though user numbers have been on somewhat of a wild ride since then.
The integration that was the main motivation behind the acquisition never really happened and cash-strapped News Corp. is now looking for a buyer. The company is looking to restrengthen its digital media arm, Fox Interactive Media, which is basically MySpace plus Photobucket, and the clear focus is on the social network. News Corp. is trying to reposition MySpace as a media entertainment hub and since it still has dedicated photo and video hosting there is no place or need for Photobucket.
News Corp. won't completely sell off Photobucket; it will apparently keep a percentage of the company. This type of transaction is starting to become rather common, with eBay an expert at buying companies and then selling them off at a much lower value. It did it for StumbleUpon, which it had bought for $75 million then sold an 85 percent stake in it for around $25 million, and it did it on a much larger scale with Skype, though surprisingly eBay managed not to lose out that much when it sold 65 percent of the VoIP company to private investors. It's unclear if this will be Photobucket's fate but more info should be coming in soon.