Instagram co-founder and CEO Kevin Systrom recently gave an interview with TechCrunch at the LeWeb Paris conference during which he discussed the company’s fate following its $700 million-plus sale to Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) back in April.
So what’s the plan?
Systrom says the deal has made it easier for him to focus on innovation and ramp up the user base, though he admits it’s far from clear how Facebook will be able to monetize Instagram and its 100 million users.
Of course, the Instagram deal was more than just about making a quick buck. Facebook has lagged with its mobile efforts for a number of years; with the Instagram team on board, things have started to improve on that front. Facebook keeps churning out new apps and updating existing ones, and just yesterday, the company launched a Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android version of its Messenger app that allows even non-Facebook members to use the service.
Instagram itself is also flexing its muscles, as seen with its move to turn off the Twitter Cards integration; in effect, it will make Instagram photos show up poorly on Twitter as an attempt to get more traffic to Instagram itself.
Tom Taulli runs the InvestorPlace blog IPO Playbook, a site dedicated to the hottest news and rumors about initial public offerings. He is also the author of “How to Create the Next Facebook” and “High-Profit IPO Strategies: Finding Breakout IPOs for Investors and Traders.” Follow him on Twitter at @ttaulli. As of this writing, he did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
A long-time follower of the IPO scene, back in 1999 Tom started one of the first sites in the space called WebIPO. It was a place where investors got research as well as access to deals for the dot-com boom. Tom also wrote the top-selling book, Investing in IPOs. In it, he covers all the aspects of analyzing an IPO, such as reading the prospectus, detecting the risk factors and understanding some of the arcane regulations. But don’t worry — if that process is too intimidating for you, thankfully Tom will do the legwork for you right here in the IPO Playbook blog.
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