Facebook Cookbook

Funding Facebook Development

Problem

I’ve heard that you can raise money if you’re a developer with a good idea. Is that true?

Solution

A number of funds have been set up to back companies building Facebook applications, including:

Facebook’s own fbFund

fbFund gives grants between $25,000 and $250,000 (grants are awesome because you don’t have to pay them back). There have been about nine grants so far, and the fund has plenty of money left in it. For more information, see http://www.facebook.com/developers/fbfund.php.

Bay Partners’ App Factory

Bay Partners, a well-respected Valley-based venture capitalist (VC), has set up a fund called App Factory, which is “a fast-track program supporting entrepreneurs dedicated to developing applications for Facebook Platform.” You can find more information at http://www.baypartners.com/appfactory/.

Altura Ventures’ Altura 1 Facebook Investment Fund

This fund exclusively backs developers of Facebook apps. You can get more info at http://www.altura.com/ or in their Facebook group at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2392191727.

Discussion

Investing in Facebook apps is really just like investing in non-Facebook apps, so there’s no reason to limit yourself to the VCs and funds just listed. If you have a solid idea and the right team to pull it off, and especially if you have a monetization strategy in place and have built out some realistic projections, you should get in front of as many potential investors as possible. If you’re unfamiliar with the world ...