MySpace CEO looking for a business bargain

MySpace - laughing in the face of the credit crunch
MySpace - laughing in the face of the credit crunch

The impending recession may spell doom and gloom for the retail and banking sector, but it seems that some tech companies – in this case MySpace – are relishing the idea of a money crisis.

Why? As it means there's a bargain or two to be had.

Speaking at the Reuters Media Summit, MySpace Co-founder and Chief Executive Chris DeWolfe spoke of the world's financial crisis, and was pretty positive about the situation, especially when it comes to picking up a start-up for a bargain price.

"At the lower levels the money dries up," commented DeWolfe. Everyone's looking for some kind of exit and the valuations we're seeing out there are definitely a small, small fraction of what they were even five or six months ago."

Number crunching

To back this up he crunched some numbers and explained via video link that some companies worth £300 million half a year ago were now worth a third less, at £200 million.

As for what the current financial climate will mean for MySpace DeWolfe, ever the optimist, believes that ad revenue would continue to rise on the site.

According to The Guardian, the company hasn't noticed a difference money-wise, commenting: "We haven't really seen any impact, other than we think we could have grown even more than we have."

Marc Chacksfield

Marc Chacksfield is the Editor In Chief, Shortlist.com at DC Thomson. He started out life as a movie writer for numerous (now defunct) magazines and soon found himself online - editing a gaggle of gadget sites, including TechRadar, Digital Camera World and Tom's Guide UK. At Shortlist you'll find him mostly writing about movies and tech, so no change there then.