The big deal today, of course, is Facebook's acquisition of Oculus VR, maker of the namesake Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, for around $2B ($400M in cash and $1.6B in Facebook common stock). Mark Zuckerberg announced the deal via his Facebook page at 5:30pm last night, giving the tech community some time to react. Minecraft creator Markus Persson apparently disagreed with the acquisition, backing out of talks with Oculus VR about creating a Minecraft version for the Oculus Rift:
We were in talks about maybe bringing a version of Minecraft to Oculus. I just cancelled that deal. Facebook creeps me out.
— Markus Persson (@notch) March 25, 2014
Also on Twitter, Marc Andreessen of VC fund Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z) noted that A16Z had led funding rounds and excused himself from the deal due to a possible conflict of interests. Oculus VR previously had raised $91M in Series A and Series B venture funding, and has so far provided a 20x return on that investment, according to Bloomberg.
This deal is Facebook's fourth acquisition of the year, and comes on the heels of its $16B ($4B in cash, $12B worth of stock) acquisition of WhatsApp last month.
King Digital, the digital entertainment company behind Candy Crush Saga, had a lackluster IPO this morning, breaking below their syndicate bid and falling from $22.50/share to around $20.00/share, a drop near 10%. The drop seemed to be fueled by comparisons to Zynga's deflated IPO and fears of King's Candy Crush Saga being a one-hit wonder.
However, unlike Zynga, King has both significant profits and a profitable track record. King's CEO Ricardo Zacconi noted on CNBC this morning that their company has been cash flow positive for 9 years, and has only taken $9M in outside capital.
Personal Blogs
After reading Zuckerberg's announcement, Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures writes about how the Oculus VR acquisition signals Facebook's search for the "next mobile", which could be anything from virtual reality to drones.
Entrepreneur-turned-VC Mark Suster reflects on his six-and-a-half years as a venture capitalist.
Far above the rabble of today's deals, marketer Seth Godin blogs a few philosophical sentences about money vs story.
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