Marc Andreessen, founder of Netscape, Opsware and Ning and the former CTO of AOL, is adding a new notch in his belt: he has joined the board of directors of Facebook, two sources close to the company confirmed to us (speculation about Andreessen possibly joining the Facebook board started last month on the Boomtown blog). The company should be announcing it shortly, perhaps this week.
Andreessen will join Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel and Jim Breyer on Facebook’s board.
At first glance, the move isn’t a fit for competitive reasons - Andreesseen is involved full time at Ning, a platform for the creation of social networks and arguably a direct competitor to Facebook. But Andreessen is known to be a mentor to Zuckerberg, who calls on him often for personal advice. It isn’t surprising that Zuckerberg would ask Andreessen to have a formal involvement with the company.
Andreessen will reportedly remain with Ning full time and retain his Chairman title.
The board position Andreessen has taken is one of the two vacant common stock seats Zuckerberg controls in addition to his own seat. One of those seats has never been filled. The other was previously held by former Facebook President Sean Parker, who left the company in late 2005.
Andreessen joins Facebook at a crucial time in its growth. Competitors MySpace and (increasingly) Google are gunning for control of the social graph, which may be the engine that drives the next big growth wave in advertising. Several early Facebook executives have left this year as the company has evolved, and new executives have taken their places. Zuckerberg needs a trusted guy in his corner to help him avoid missteps like the launch of Beacon last year, which has led to serious privacy concerns. Andreessen has fought similar battles in the past and won, and his counsel is clearly a competitive advantage.
Photo credit: Mathieu Thouvenin
Update: This has now been officially announced.
I think, this move will strategically position facebook for IPO very soon
it’s all about advertising. facebook needs to advance this fast and zuckerberg will need all the help he can get to pull that off big time to show the world that his company is really worth 15 billion. marc is a smart dude. given how related ning is to facebook, i wouldn’t be surprised if they forged a deal on advertising some time in the near term.
i am concerned about the user value story for facebook. the application platform was a big hit for them, but usage is going down. they have to continue to promote third party innovation. here’s an article discussing this and providing interesting reasons for the phenomena and why it may slow down even further:
http://zooie.wordpress.com/
They may need use TimeBridge to schedule their board calls now…
Oh great, now the Voyeur who brought the world “cookies” is about to bring new snoop-techniques to Facebook!
The guy should be doing time somewhere for violating the privacy of the entire world!
facebook is becoming powerful though, but according to http://www.themostpowerfulcompany.com they are not in a good position right now
JustMe - yeah, he was such a jerk for bringing the Internet to the masses.
A possible Ning + FB could be in horizon.
JustMe - You could look at this the other way around. I would venture that Andreessen will most likely be the “voice” of the users. Meaning, mellow-out financial aggressiveness with user sensibility.
I also find this interesting on another level… Facebook is one big PHP application and Andreessen is a huge proponent of PHP–Ning is built on it and he was on the board of Zend (the php company).
Wasn’t he shitting on Facebook recently?
попова регистрация ооо Статья 40. Единоличный исполнительный орган общества Единоличный
1. исполнительный орган общества (генеральный директор, и президент другие) избирается общим собранием участников общества на срок, определенный уставом общества. Единоличный исполнительный орган общества может быть избран также и не из его числа участников. Договор между обществом лицом, и осуществляющим функции единоличного исполнительного органа общества, подписывается от имени общества лицом, председательствовавшим нате общем собрании участников общества, на котором лицо, избрано осуществляющее функции единоличного исполнительного органа общества, или участником общества, уполномоченным решением общего собрания участников общества.
2. качестве В единоличного исполнительного органа общества может только выступать физическое лицо, за исключением случая, предусмотренного статьей 42 настоящего Федерального закона.
3. Единоличный исполнительный орган общества:
1) без действует доверенности от имени общества, в числе том представляет его интересы и совершает сделки;
2) выдает доверенности на право представительства от имени общества, в том числе доверенности правом с передоверия;
3) издает приказы о назначении на должности общества, работников об их переводе и увольнении, применяет меры поощрения и налагает дисциплинарные
4) взыскания; осуществляет иные полномочия, не отнесенные настоящим Федеральным законом или уставом общества к компетенции общего собрания участников общества, совета директоров (наблюдательного совета) общества и коллегиального органа исполнительного общества.
4. Порядок деятельности единоличного исполнительного органа общества и им принятия решений устанавливается уставом общества, внутренними документами общества, а также договором, между заключенным обществом и лицом, осуществляющим функции его единоличного
@Регистрации
Yes. Absolutely.
Zuck needs to relinquish a position of a CEO and allow someone competent to take over and bring the company to liquidity. He is simply inexperienced and incapable to lead.
Регистрации - wow, you just totally nailed it.
Ning and Facebook are basically competitors.
Would Andreessen not be privy to sensitive information in his board role, and how could he guarantee that (even subconsciously) that information would not influence his strategic decisions at Ning?
It’s interesting to see Marc Endreessen being on top of both the social networking giants.
He,rather than seeing FB as just a competitor has also seen the benefits of being one of the FB directorial position.
Smart Move…
we agree with Davey: what about the conflict of interest with Ning?
One can not help but wonder how Marc feels about the controversial tactics used by Microsoft to kill off Netscape.
He does not appear to outwardly bitter - has he ever spoken publicly about it.
It is sort of ironic that Tim Berners Lee complained about Marc’s tactics to make it appear the Netscape invented the WEB.
So perhaps it is just business as usual -
This is the reason why he has taken a break from his blog? (http://blog.pmarca.com/ )- his blog is much more interesting than FB…
The more I think about it - Marc’s quote that goes something like “Don’t sell a company that’s growing” - is one of the dumber things I’ve heard on the internet, and would be really bad advice for facebook.
no conflict of interest. he’s just a hired hitchiker along for the ride. get someone in there with some real life nuts and bolts experience. hype bubble 101.
http://www.FacesLocator.com
sounds like a conflict of interest to me too
He just wants Facebook’s office space. He’s such an office space whore
astonished to see a long russian comment
Ning caters to a completely different audience than FB. People join FB b/c that’s where everyone else is like Myspace. Ning lets people create their own smaller communities.
They are not competitors. Together, they see Viacom (w/e their Ning competitor is called) and Fox (MySpace)
@Регистрации : (thanks google translate for his effort
Article 40. Sole executive organ of society Edinolichny
1. the executive organ of society (CEO, President and others) was elected general meeting of participants in society at the time, some charter company. Sole executive organ of society may also be elected and not from its number of participants. The agreement between society face, and carrying out the functions of single-member executive body, signed on behalf of society face, chaired kind general meeting of participants of society, in which the person performing the functions of elected single-member executive body, or society party, authorized the decision of the general assembly of participants of society.
2. In a single-member executive body could only speak a natural person, except as provided in Article 42 of this Federal Law.
3. Sole executive organ of society:
1) without a valid power of attorney on behalf of society, including that represents its interests and commits the transaction;
2) gives power of attorney for the right to representation on behalf of society, including the power of attorney with the law peredoveriya;
3) issue orders of appointment to the post of society, the workers of their transfer and dismissal, uses incentives and imposes disciplinary
4) recovery; exercise other powers, not classified this federal law or charter of a company within the competence of the general meeting of participants in society, the board of directors (supervisory board) and society’s collective executive organ of society.
4. The operational procedures of single-member executive body and his decision establishes the charter company, internal documents of society, as well as a treaty concluded between society and the person exercising the functions of his sole
Oh great, now the Voyeur who brought the world “cookies” is about to bring new snoop-techniques to Facebook!
The guy should be doing time somewhere for violating the privacy of the entire world!
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