By the fall of 1999, Starmedia was rushed to a significant lead in the race to acquire Latin American Internet users. Its pan-regional, horizontal portal was the first target Spanish and Portuguese speakers in the internet, registering 1.2 billion page views in the third quarter of 1999. Thirty-three-year-old co-founder Fernando Espuelas Starmedia was toast "Silicon Alley" and a recognized hero throughout Latin America. His picture on the cover of the magazine Internet World - break open the shirt to show the logo Starmedia, like Superman, summed up the spirit of the company. But each day brought the announcement of a new initiative in the heavyweight retribution. To maintain its leadership, Starmedia raised and spent money at a feverish pace, the promotion of its brand, the acquisition of companies, as well as the launch of new initiatives Web. Loss for the year 1999 is projected to be $ 90 million on revenue of $ 19 million, the burn rate made sustainable private and public funding rounds, which netted the company half a billion dollars since the beginning in 1996. As of December 1999, Starmedia company evolved from a pure web-integrated media company, which extended to the ISP, mobile phone, broadband and enterprise production with more than 700 employees in 12 countries. As the new millennium, the main issue before the executive team Starmedia was how best to use the company's infrastructure to maintain and expand its traffic management - and monetize their audience - in an environment that is both more competitive and more sophisticated. Includes color exhibits.
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by Thomas R. Eisenmann Source: Harvard Business School 33 pages. Publication Date: January 19, 2000. Prod. #: 800166-HCC-ENG
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