In December, Twitter raised $200 million in financing in a deal that valued it at $3.7 billion. The company, which allows users to broadcast 140-character messages to groups of followers, had 175 million users as of September and is growing by an estimated 15 million members per month.
The Wall Street Journal reported on its website that executives at Twitter have held "low level" talks with executives at Facebook and Google recently about a possible takeover of Twitter, but all parties have declined to comment on the matter publicly. Both Google and Facebook have expressed an interest in buying Twitter in the past and have kept the lines of communication open, people familiar with the matter said. One of these people said companies including Facebook and Google have expressed "latent interest" in an acquisition.
Despite the valuation, the report said Twitter"s executives and board were working on building a large, independent company. "People familiar with the situation said the company believes it can grow into a $100 billion company," the WSJ said.
Twitter, created in 2006, is among a group of popular Internet social networking websites that includes Facebook, Zynga and LinkedIn.
The company, which only started advertising in 2010, allowed the micro-blogging site to rack up $45 million in revenue for 2010 by promoting trending topics,. Twitter"s revenue number, according to eMarketer, will triple this year alone to $150 million.
Image credit: eMarketer