Press / Ning Factsheet
About Ning
Based in Palo Alto, Calif., Ning offers an innovative and easy-to-use technology platform for people to join and create new social networks for their interests and passions and meet new people around the things they care about most about in their life.
With over 1 million social networks created and more than 27 million registered members, millions of people everyday are coming together across Ning social networks to explore and express their interests, discover new passions, and meet new people around shared pursuits.
Ning also enables artists, brands, and organizations to simplify and control their online presence with their own unique social network that beautifully integrates with other social media services while providing the most direct, unique and lucrative relationship with fans, consumers, and members.
Founded in October 2004 by Gina Bianchini and Marc Andreessen, Ning launched the Ning Platform in October 2005 and Ning Networks in February 2007. The company is privately held.
Product
Ning's flagship application is a Ning Network. Launched in February 2007, Ning Networks give people the opportunity to join and create new social networks for their interests and passions and meet new people around the things they care about most in their life.
A Ning Network offers over 50 different themes as well as the option to completely control its CSS. As a Ning Network Creator, you have a wide choice of features – videos, photos, chat, music, groups, events, and blogs – in addition to a latest activity feature, member profile pages, friends, messaging, email notifications, RSS support, and third-party applications a member or Ning Creator can add to their Ning Network. As a result of this broad set of choices, each Ning Network is unique and special in its purpose, design, branding, and features.
As of June 2009, there were over 1.2M Ning Networks, growing at a rate of almost 4,000 new Ning Networks each day.
Privacy
From the beginning, Ning has built comprehensive privacy features into both Ning Networks and the Ning Platform to allow both Ning Network Creators and Members to control their privacy at every level. Ning uniquely offers the choice of public or private social networks as well as multiple privacy levels within a Ning Network.
Ning Network Creators can choose to moderate members before they join or simply show the social network's homepage to non-members. Members of Ning Networks have full control over who sees their profiles and content within a social network on Ning or on Ning.com.
Timeline
October 2004: Began development of the Ning Platform, a programmable technology platform with the goal of enabling millions of people to create and join their own social networks with as much choice and flexibility in the topic, features, design, and members as possible.
October 2005: Publicly launched the Ning Platform with 20+ simple social applications from ratings to reviews, groups, photos, and confessions. 40,000 simple applications created in 16 months.
February 2007: Publicly launched Ning Networks. 17,000 new social networks created in the first month.
December 2007: Ended the year with 144,000 Ning Networks.
October 2008: Launched OpenSocial profile application support on member profiles across Ning Networks with 30+ third-party developers. OpenSocial profile applications grew to 80 different applications in a week.
October 2008: Announced August 2009 launch of Ning Apps and a new way to expand the feature choice across Ning Networks.
December 2008: Ended the year with 700,000 Ning Networks.
January 2009: Removed adult social networks from the Ning Platform.
March 2009: Launched a new set of member services on Ning.com to provide Ning Network Creators and Members a way to quickly stay up-to-date on the activity across their Ning Networks, discover new Ning Networks, and manage their identity and participation across the social networks on Ning.
April 2009: Passed 1,000,000 Ning Networks.
May 2009: Launched the private beta for Ning Apps with over 90 new applications Ning Network Creators can add to their social networks on Ning.
Funding
2004 Series A: $1.7M from Marc Andreessen; 2006 Series B: $8.8M from Marc Andreessen; 2007 Series C: $48.9M from Legg Mason and T. Rowe Price with Ziff Davis, CBS, and Marc Andreessen participating; 2008 Series D: $63.1M from an undisclosed lead investor with T. Rowe Price and Morgan Stanley participating.
Board
Members: Gina Bianchini (co-founder and CEO) and Marc Andreessen (co-founder and Chairman). Observer: Randy Befumo. Observer: Victor Thay.
Statistics
5.7M unique visitors in May 2009, according to comScore.
Offices
Headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif.
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