Contact: Ben Kolada
Comment aggregation and social engagement startup Livefyre has been busy lately. The company recently moved into a larger office and just launched a new product. Meanwhile, its 29-year-old CEO is hitting the fundraising circuit, hoping to secure additional VC financing to propel its growth.
Livefyre was founded by Jordan Kretchmer in 2009 with the mission of aggregating comments from social networking outlets on publishers’ websites. However, the startup has expanded beyond that. Its StreamHub product, which recently made its commercial debut, provides a real-time blogging and chatting platform to publishers. It aggregates comments, videos and images from social networks using customizable widgets. The company is also making a push to expand beyond its publishing customer base toward brands.
Livefyre is serving a niche of the greater digital marketing industry, and its products still have room for improvement, but publishers and brands are already finding value in what it offers. The vendor’s partners include WordPress and Google. It’s projecting $10m in bookings for this year.
To aid future growth, Livefyre is taking its message to venture investors. To date, it has raised $5.3m in venture capital from Greycroft Partners, Cue Ball, Hillsven Capital, Zelkova Ventures and ff Venture Capital. Livefyre wouldn’t comment on the amount it’s hoping to secure in its C round, but by this stage companies typically look for $5-10m. The financing will be used for hiring, product development and marketing and sales. Livefyre expects to close the round by year-end.
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