The merger announcement between QuePasa and MyYearbook took many by surprise. What do these companies have in common? How is the deal going to affect Que Pasa’s activities in the U.S. Hispanic and Latin American markets? Well, we listened to the investors conference call and did some other homework. This is what we understand is going to happen:
• Audience Aggregation and Social Media/Mobile/Tech play
According to QuePasa and MyYearbook executives the” deal creates value by positioning the combined company as a high growth, public leader in social discovery and social media technology." While the name of the new company is not known yet, both company’s users will be able to login to both sites with the same account login info. The idea is to strengthen the ability of QuePasa to attract people massively in Latin America and the ability of My Yearbook to get new users. According to the executives present at the investor conference call, “When people want to interact with friends or people they know, they use Facebook, but when they want to meet new people, they use My Yearbook.” The” meet new people process” is called “social discovery”.
• QuePasa will attempt to reach global audiences, not just Latin
As Ryan Harvey, VP of Capital Markets at QuePasa put it. QuePasa-MyYearbook is planning to expand its audiences globally, while still catering to U.S. Hispanic and Latin American audiences. He thinks that meeting new people is a human core activity so the addressable market is global.
• Mobile Apps: strengthen development
Both companies are similar in the way they are experiencing an evolving in mobile apps. This is one of the things they are going to continue developing.
• Gaming is Hot
The merger also positions the new company to expand in the social gaming realm. Online games are a hot area because of the very high engagement they provide to users and the high CPM’s advertisers are able to charge as a result.
Leadership:
MyYearbook CEO, Geoff Cook will serve as COO and President of the Consumer Internet Division and join the company´s board of directors. myYearbook will designate two additional directors to the QuePasa’s board.
