A video posted by Seesmic founder and CEO Loic LeMuer today suggests that Seesmic has acquired TweetDeck .
Having watched the video three times I’m not sure whether Loic (Seesmic) and Iain Dodsworth (TweetDeck) are joking or not, but the video does clearly refer to a big announcement and acquisition. Dodsworth also says that he has a “new job” and holds up a Seesmic sticker for good measure (see picture above). The pair say the announcement will be made “tomorrow” and will create a “dominant force” according to Dodsworth.
If they’re being serious, this is a huge buy for Seesmic and will immediately place the company into the leading position in the Twitter client market. Rumor has it that Loic has been sitting on a pile of VC dollars for a long time, and with the original Seesmic video product all but closed down, it had to find a home eventually.
If true: congrats to all involved. The video of the announcement of sorts below.
Update: we’ve got emails in asking for confirmation or whether they were just taking the piss. A couple of stats: TweetDeck took an angel round of $500,000 from BetaWorks in January at an unknown valuation. Seesmic has taken $12 million over two rounds, and as noted above, rumor has it that Loic is still sitting on at least half of that money. Hard to value TweetDeck, but I’m going to suggest something around the $4-5 million mark, maybe a little less (I’d bet the January valuation was in the $1-2m range.) Given Loic and Iain talk in the video of a partnership, the deal (if it happened) may have consisted of cash and Seesmic equity.
Update 2 : Loic has responded via email claiming the video was a joke, although we hear that there is some sort of announcement due tomorrow from another source. We’re thinking probably less than 50% likely at this stage, but we’ll wait to tomorrow to be sure.
Thanks to JJ Projects for the tip and video via Kosso.
