Software giant Microsoft is about to purchase a "minority stake" in social network site Facebook, according to reports.

Talks with Facebook executives, including founder Mark Zuckerberg, could value the company at almost $10 billion (£5 billion), the Wall Street Journal says.

Any advance from Microsoft, which is keen to add social networking to its broadband portfolio would be for a five per cent share of the company – a similar figure to that looked at by internet search giant Google earlier this year.

Andy Miedler, from US brokerage firm Edward Jones, told the news provider: "We think it's likely that Microsoft would be considering an investment in Facebook given their existing relationship and the strong growth potential of that market."

Figures released by comScore last month showed that the amount of daily users on Facebook rose by 366 per cent between January and July this year.


Tuesday, 25th September 2007

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