They stressed the capacity of Betfair to hold up well during tough economic times and Betfair's gambling business model, which helped it weather the downturn a little better than other consumer-focused companies. Betfair moves up to the number 3 spot this year from number 4 in 2008.
Betfair saw revenue declines in 2009 due to belt tightening even among gamblers, falling to us$ 450 million from us$ 500 milion. The company generated 20 %-plus profit margins in 2006, which has likely increased the past three years as the company increased scale.
With strong revenue growth, solid profit margins and a resilient business model, the organizers apply a 10-times multiple to revenue to come up with a us$ 4.5 billion valuation. Located in London and San Francisco, Betfair CEO is David Yu. The company's investors are Index Ventures, JP Morgan Partners, Benchmark Capital, UBS Capital, and Soft Bank.
Facebook has grown at a tremendous clip this year, but digital media multiples have come down so Facebook’s value has stayed the same. Wikipedia could be worth us$ 5 billion if it tried to make money.