Photobucket.com, and mobile imaging service provider Ontela, will merge their operations.
The combined company, which will be known as Photobucket
Corporation, will leverage the assets of two of the online photo
industry’s leading players.
The combination will bring together
Photobucket’s massive audience of more than 22 million monthly unique
users in the U.S.* with Ontela’s leading-edge software that is
currently in use on more than 30 wireless carriers, including Verizon
and T-Mobile. Photobucket will leverage Ontela’s wireless carrier
relationships to provide distribution and consumer access to more than
140 million wireless subscribers, while Ontela will drive uptake of its
mobile applications by capitalizing on Photobucket’s brand and highly
active user base.
News Corporation, which acquired Photobucket in 2007, will hold a
significant equity stake in the combined company and will be
represented on the company’s board of directors. The Photobucket
management team will continue to operate the business and play strong
leadership roles in the combined company.
Tom Munro, Ontela’s chief financial officer, who will become
president of the combined company said, “We are pleased to bring
together these two dynamic companies that are at the leading edge of
the explosion of content sharing in the digital photography space. We
believe Photobucket’s vast consumer audience and content leadership -
and the talented team of professionals who have driven the business -
complements and brings great promise to Ontela’s technology leadership
in mobile photo sharing applications.”
Jon Miller, chairman and CEO of Digital Media for News Corporation,
who will serve as a director of the combined company, said, “In
partnering with Ontela and its investors, we are able to maintain and
expand our strong foothold in the online imaging category. As consumers
evolve the ways in which they capture, consume and share their photos
and video across multiple devices, there couldn’t be a more perfect
partner for Photobucket to align with as it enters this new chapter.”
Photobucket is one of the largest standalone photo sites in the
world. More than 11 million photos, graphics, and videos are uploaded
to Photobucket every day and the site serves more than 100 billion
images each month.
Ontela is the leading provider of services that get pictures off
camera phones. Ontela’s proprietary technology automatically uploads
pictures from phones, solving the last remaining problem with mobile
photography - getting at the pictures. Ontela’s technology has been
certified by 30 operators, including Verizon, T-Mobile, and Alltel on
more than 100 handsets. It also is available preinstalled on devices
from all five of the top global handset manufacturers