Valuefirst seems to be on an acquisition and investment spree. Its first target was social media product Tagg.in earlier this year which it acquired. Now it has gone ahead and made a strategic investment in one of the Indian social networks in Indyarocks. Indyarocks was launched in early 2007 and came out from it private beta avatar to a public beta. It then added games as a core feature to its platform in 2008. Later that year they also launched a mobile version.
With rising traction for the platform we spoke to Kalyan Manyan who is the Founder of Indyarocks in an exclusive WATShow last year. Early this year they introduced the concept of social money for their users.
ValueFirst Messaging which is a Gurgaon-based enterprise mobility and communication services company has made this investment as part of its plan to enhance its presence in media properties in India.
Indyarocks currently claims that it has around 8 million subscribers and is profitable. The mobile- web combination after this deal should further help drive revenues for Indyarocks. Plans are in place by Valuefirst to extend the monetization from the current online advertising only mode to mobile part using its mobile ad network SpotOn as told to VCCircle.
This isn’t the first time we are seeing a mobile company investing/acquiring a web firm. Recently Netcore made an announcement regarding its acquisition of Oneindia which is owned by Greynium. This acquisition was also made on the lines of the possibilities of a web + mobile play in the Indian market. We believe we shall see more such synergies and deals upcoming in the days to come.
