3/26/08
Private equity firm TPG Growth made the investment. Become.com, which went live in 2004, had raised just over $11 million in two previous funding rounds.
Katie Deatsch , Senior Editor
Comparison shopping site Become.com has raised $17.5 million in capital from private equity firm TPG Growth. Become.com, which went live in 2004, had raised just over $11 million in two previous funding rounds.
In connection with the financing, Taek Kwon, a partner with TPG Growth, will join Become.com’s board of directors.
"TPG’s investment validates our approach," says Michael Yang, Become.com`s founder and CEO, who also founded comparison shopping site MySimon. "We are passionate about providing the most value to our merchants and our shoppers who use Become.com to make ideal buying decisions.”
“We are thrilled to invest in Become.com, a rapidly growing company that not only operates the fastest growing comparison shopping site but has also developed a unique search engine technology platform that provides various new opportunities for growth,” says Kwon of TPG Growth. “We look forward to working with the great team at Become.com to build the top comparison shopping company.”
Become.com says it has been profitable for the past two quarters, but does not release details of its finances.
Become.com was ranked 13th among comparison shopping sites in August 2007 by comScore Inc., with 2.3 million unique visitors, a 46% increase over August 2006. The company says there were 10,025,950 unique visits to its site in January, but did not say how many unique visitors there were.
TPG Growth is the venture, growth and smaller buyout investment platform of Fort Worth, TX-based private equity firm TPG. TPG Growth manages $2.5 billion in assets, while TPG, formerly known as Texas Pacific Group, manages more than $50 billion in investments, the company says.