An active week in tech for this week’s edition of M&A:
- Dropbox: The cloud-computing company completed its latest round of funding on Tuesday, raising $250 million in a series led by investors such as Index Ventures, Goldman Sachs, and RIT Capital Partners. Dropbox claims to have 45 million users in 175 countries as of this year; its most recent valuation is reported to be $4 billion. Check out the in-depth profile on Dropbox’s founder Drew Houston in the latest edition of Forbes here. [Dropbox]
- Groupon: The daily deal site founded by Northwestern alum Andrew Mason (’03) continues on the road to its IPO this week with a massive valuation cut from a previously speculated $30 billion to a (relatively) more modest $12 billion. The announcement comes in the wake of accusations concerning misleading accounting and an arguably unstable business model. Groupon, which offers local discounts to its 115 million subscribers reported $688 million in revenue for the first two quarters this year. Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and Credit Suisse are underwriting the deal. [DealBook]
- Yahoo: The web search company has been considering bids from various private equity firms and institutional investors, the most recent of which has been Silver Lake Partners. Many of Yahoo’s potential suitors, including Silver Lake, appear to be working with Microsoft (who tried, unsuccessfully, to complete a takeover 2008) as a partner on any potential deal that may develop. Allen & Company and Goldman Sachs are advising Yahoo on the deal. [WSJ]
