UPDATED 23:24 EDT / JULY 06 2021

APPS

Hyperlocal social networking startup Nextdoor to go public via SPAC merger

Hyperlocal social networking startup Nextdoor Inc. is set to go public as the company announced today that it will do so through a special-purpose acquisition company.

The deal will see Nextdoor merge with Khosla Ventures Acquisition Co. II and values the company at $4.3 billion. Under the deal, Nextdoor will raise $686 million in gross proceeds, including $270 million in private investment in public equity. Investors include T. Rowe Price, Baron Capital, Dragoneer, Soroban Capital, ARK Invest, ION Asset Management, Tiger Global and Hedosophia.

Founded in 2008 and launched in the U.S. in 2011, Nextdoor offers a hyperlocal social networking service for neighborhoods. The service allows users to organize events, alert neighbors of danger and spread helpful information such as business postings or COVID-19 news.

The service, which requires all users to confirm their identity, has not been without controversy. Nextdoor has at various times been accused of facilitating racism. The issue arises in that when users warn their neighbors that a potential criminal in their neighborhood, that person is sometimes a person of color.

Nextdoor has been vocal in its stance against racism, launching an anti-racism notification to prevent discriminatory language in April and implementing anti-racism tools on its site.

In 2014, co-founder and the initial Chief Executive Nirav Tolia was involved in a hit-and-run accident that left a woman injured on Highway 101 in Brisbane, California. “It’s ironic that the CEO of a company that is holding itself out as trying to promote neighborliness, crime watch and things like that flees the scene of an accident that he caused and doesn’t bother to call 911 or stay around to exchange information or see if he caused any injuries,” the woman’s attorney said at the time. Tolia served 30 days of community service, in lieu of jail time, for fleeing the scene.

Nextdoor currently has 37 million active weekly users, or neighbors in the company’s terminology, and claims that its users cover one in three U.S. households over 275,000 neighborhoods. According to CNBC, the company saw its active users grow 50% over the last year, along with accelerating average revenue per user.

Coming into its SPAC merger, Nextdoor has raised $447.9 million in venture capital funding, according to data from Crunchbase.

Image: Nextdoor

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