Lots of bad news leaking out of Israeli startup eSnips this week. The company, which is part social network and part file uploading service, continues to grow - recent Comscore says they had 8 million unique visitors in January, up from 2.2 million a year ago. But founding CEO Yael Elish left the company for “personal reasons” just as they were closing a round of funding a couple of months ago.
The funding, inevitably, fell apart. The company tried to regroup under chairman Nahum Sharfman, who took over as acting CEO. But they eventually went the layoff route, letting most of the 16 or so employees go.
It’s not clear if the company will fold or find a way to continue operations. But storm clouds have massed over what was once a promising startup.
To date eSnips has raised $5 million, mostly from Gemini Israel Funds and Greylock. We’re putting them on DeadPool watch.
Thats really too bad, its never good to see a startup have so much potential and then just run into a brick wall like this
1 more pos site down the drain
What is happening in Israel? Something is just not right. A couple of weeks ago it was Knocka and now eSnips.
Hmmm, looks like the instability of the socio-economic and cultural differences in the region are starting to make inroads into the Israeli start-up business culture. Or is this a simple revolt of Venture Capital guys versus Founders. I smell a big story coming!!!!
Innovation and drama; Israel’s contribution to the tech world.
@MikeW, well said!
I was trying to find more info on Yael on the internet and I came across this: http://www.whatsnew.in/ - looks like someone scraping the entire Techcrunch site!
Two Israeli based companies have ‘drama’ and you attribute it to the region’s instability?By this standard, given the number of Silicon Valley start-ups that fail on a regular basis, California must be experiencing a catastrophic upheaval!
@art, Thats crazy, How come they not copied the comments also
This is a real shame as eSnips is a really brilliant concept.
So here’s the deal for people who don’t know: it was clear from the get go that nothing good will come out of this. The CEO is married to the CTO, focusing on self-PR rather than on the business (anyone who met her felt she saw herself as the female version of Brin/Page). Come on…a wannabe that gets herself cover stories detailing her “success” before nothing of significance has happened? they better sell the thing to someone who knows what he is doing and is focused on working. Don’t know about esnips, but she is personally heading to the deadpool, and we all hope not to hear about her again.
@michal: hello. i know yael personally, and she is not the person you describe. in fact, you sound like a disgruntled employee…before you run about casting judgement, consider that there may be very valid reasons for such a sudden change. seriously, stop. think.
btw, when is the app built to power crunchbase going to go opensource?
Dave,
She is useless if she cannot put the company in order, she must go away NOW!
Isn’t it possible that her exit relates to the fund raising?
Maybe they decided they wanted a new CEO for next stage and she thought she’d let them have their wish.
@Michal (10) - This is not what we came here for, your personal gossip. I wonder what happened in your life to cause such bitterness and ill intentions?
being an entreprenuer is tough - we should all support each other and Yael. Lets support her by putting more comments like this here - or do you want to see many Michal’s in our industry?
I used to work with eSnips and in my dealings with Yael, she was extremely focused on the business and eSnips success. (note: up 5.8 million from last year)
And as for promotion, why not? It’s a social networking site that has 8 million uniques, no small feat in a crowded market where there is a new one being launched every week.
I was thrilled to see someone acknowledge how tough it is to be an entrepreneur. Just because she left eSnips doesn’t mean she’s any less of one nor does it mean that eSnips can’t continue to successfully serve their loyal user-base.