Area served USA , Latin America Employees ~75 (2006) | Industry Social media Users 90 million (2016) | |
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Type of business Public
Previous Stock Symbol (NYSE: QPSA) Available in Spanish
English
Portuguese Key people John Abbott, CEO
Michael Matte, CFO
Louis Bardov, CTO Stock price MEET (NASDAQ) US$ 5.35 +0.16 (+3.08%)20 Mar, 4:00 PM GMT-4 - Disclaimer Founded June 1997, Phoenix, Arizona, United States Headquarters New Hope, Pennsylvania, United States Subsidiaries Skout, TechFront Studios, Ltd., Corazones.com Founders Jeffrey Peterson, Catherine Cook, David Cook Profiles | ||
23 august 2011 quepasa corp rings the nyse opening bell
Quepasa Corporation was a US-based social media technology company catering to Latin Audiences worldwide. Quepasa owned and operated Quepasa.com, a social network, Quepasa Games (formerly Techfront), a social game development studio, and Quepasa Contests, a social media advertising solution (formerly Quepasa DSM). Initially founded as a Hispanic web portal and later revived by its founder as a Social Network that grew to over 30 million users, Quepasa was the first publicly traded company focused on the bilingual English/Spanish language U.S. Hispanic internet demographic.
Contents
- 23 august 2011 quepasa corp rings the nyse opening bell
- About
- History
- Growth
- Management controversy
- Events
- First Publicly Traded Social Network
- References
In 2012, Quepasa suspended operations after a $100 million acquisition, name change and sale to MeetMe.
About
Founded in Phoenix, Arizona and later with headquarters in West Palm Beach, Florida (with offices in Scottsdale, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami and Mexico), Quepasa Corporation owned Quepasa.com, one of the world's largest, bicultural & bilingual Latino Social Networks on-line. Quepasa.com, and sister site Corazones.com served users in the U.S., Mexico, Latin America and the world in Spanish, English, and Portuguese. In July, 2011, the company merged with teen social network myYearbook
History
Quepasa Corporation was founded by Jeffrey Peterson in 1997. The Company was headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona, with offices in Los Angeles, California and West Palm Beach, Florida.
In 1998 Quepasa raised US$20 million from private investors, including television broadcaster Telemundo and Phoenix sports businessman Jerry Colangelo. Costa Rican President Jose Maria Figueres and former CNBC Chief Business Commentator William Siedman joined the Board of Directors.
Quepasa had its Initial Public Offering on the Nasdaq Stock Market on June 24, 1999, selling 4.6 million shares at $12 per share. By July 1999, Quepasa had raised over $100 million. Quepasa shares registered billions of dollars per month in trading volume on Nasdaq during the dot-com Internet boom.
In July 2011, the company led a merger with myYearbook a teen focused social network.
Growth
In 1999 Quepasa invested tens of millions of dollars in thousands of outdoor Spanish-language billboard advertisements, network radio promotions and various national television brand-building campaigns featuring the music of its corporate spokesperson and investor, Gloria Estefan.
At the peak of the Internet boom in the year 2000, market research firm Cheskin Research ranked Quepasa as the most popular destination for U.S. Hispanics, despite costly marketing campaigns by Starmedia and Terra. Shares of Quepasa rose on Nasdaq to a market value of $400 million at their peak.
In 2010, an article published by Adweek noted "record setting numbers for Quepasa" in a "fierce latin social networking climate" with Facebook, Hi5, Tagged.com, Sonico and others.
In 2011 Quepasa announced a partnership with PRISA Digital, a Spanish media conglomerate. The agreement designates PRISA as a reseller of Quepasa advertising products.
In 2011, Quepasa also acquired XtFt Games, owner of Brazil-based social game development studio TechFront. In May 2011 Quepasa launched its first social gaming title after the acquisition, Wonderful City - Rio, on Quepasa.com and Orkut. Quepasa launched the game in partnership with Mentez, a Latin American-focused social network game publisher based in Miami.
Management controversy
Shortly after Quepasa went public in late 1999, Quepasa founder Jeffrey Peterson was ousted by a new CEO.
During the .com bust of 2001, Quepasa shares lost practically all of their value on Nasdaq. When existing management attempted to liquidate company assets, Peterson gained control of Quepasa through a successful hostile takeover and proxy fight. He was reinstated in 2002 as Chairman and CEO.
Events
First Publicly Traded Social Network
In 2010 and 2011, several media publications reported that Quepasa was the "only publicly traded social network," meaning Quepasa was the only Social Network trading on a Stock Exchange at that time. This is especially noteworthy as the Initial Public Offering for the best known Social Network in history, Facebook, was several years later on Friday, May 18, 2012. If these historical dates prove correct, Quepasa may have been the first publicly traded Social Network.