Does anyone know if this is truth or rumour?  It's a few days old now, I thought there would be chatter if it was correct.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/22/fotolia-takes-a-massive-50-to-100-million-round-from-ta-associates/

My experience with TA is they have a bottom of $60 million.

Sounds more like Fotolia is in acquisition mode, I would not imagine subordinate debt. ... wonder who they are buying.

In my experience a venture capital firm like TA would be far too smart for paying $50m to $100m for a company like Fotolia. Even for a full buy-out this is massively overpriced in todays economy.

My guess is that the Fotolia owners try hard to sell their company and simply spread some rumours for impressing uninformed investors.

Why would TA be "far too smart" to buy FT at those prices? If you crunch the known figures backwards it suggests that FT currently has an annual turnover of about $45M of which they're only paying out about 35-38% in commissions. On the basis of sales it is probably about double the size that IS was when they got bought out.

Anyway the report is emphatic that TA has not actually bought FT, although they must have acquired a huge chunk of it. I think Litifeta may be spot on suggesting that they may be in acquisition mode __ I can't think of any other reason why a business in apparently robust health would need such a large cash injection.

Makes you wonder who they are after? Surely SS and DT are the only two other major players, still in private ownership, that could command such figures. Looks to me that only SS would cost anything like the sort of money being talked about. Fascinating.

Very interesting information.  Thanks for posting Pixart.

I don't know how exactly this sheds light on their current inexplicable action to start a massive free image site, but I am sure it does somehow. 

It is starting to look like Getty, and now Fotolia (or TA Associates) are in a massive game of trying to undercut the competition and ultimately keep all the marbles for themselves. 

Competition for contributors was great when it was happening and driving royalties up, but this race to slash prices and put the other guys out of business really doesn't look to have an up side for contributors.   

Totally agree with this. I'm worried they are taking the WalMart approach: Slash prices, put your competitors out of business, screw your suppliers. The funny things is, WalMart's suppliers are chomping at the bit to sell there even knowing that they put a downward pressure on prices. Many a supplier has been put out of business because of the squeeze WalMart puts on them.

I've yet to see any real evidence for this __ just lots of speculation and conspiracy theories. Yes, some agencies have cheaper offerings than others but this most often just reflects the size and quality of their respective libraries.

There's also precious little evidence that a significant proportion of the real buyers are particularly price-sensitive anyway. For example most Emerald and above contributors at FT don't report losing sales when they put their prices up. DT and BigStock both had very simple and cheap pricing structures when they started but it didn't mean that they rapidly gained market share over the others __ quite the reverse in fact as they probably didn't make enough profit to invest in adequate marketing.

So many things are going on.  This funding.  The PhotoXpress launch.  The new CEO (sorry, forget the Istock dude's name at the moment).  Since PhotoXpress just came out this week and since they have disclosed virtually nothing about the site....  perhaps they are taking the approach of a a crack dealer.  Give everybody a taste of the crack and lure them in.  I can't possibly fathom what the benefit of that site is as it is today with no revenue.  There has to be a big picture that we are not privy to.  "Customers" will have to eventually realize how limited free sites are and want to buy something better.    I have only skimmed their terms (as a photographer not a customer).  When you sign up for free downloads, are you really signing up for something else? 

I used to work in the theatre, and shortly before they filed for Chapter 11, a big Hollywood producer came in like a white night and infused a ton of money.  Then they found out about the Securities fraud etc. and the business was forced into bankruptcy.  (Yup, bad investment.)  Another reason for the cash infusion may be that FT just isn't doing well.  It's easy to say that we get such a low % they must be raking in the bucks - but who really knows.

anyway, good to see some private equity still exists. Maybe TA should look at buying out Francisco Partners, they have some great assets, albeit, they paid way too much for them.

TA's VP, Christian Gr�nwald is on the board of FT according to his bio here http://www.ta.com/team/team_london.asp?ID=91  so they must be in bed together.  But who's bed?

If TA have invested hugely in FT then it would be standard practice for their interests to be represented via a place on the board. Not sure we can read into it any more than that.