Yuri Milner

source: NYTimes

Twitter is in the process of raising $400 million in a deal that values the company at $8 billion, according to sources.

The financing round, which will be split into two portions, will be led by DST Global, the investment firm headed by the Russian billionaire Yuri Milner. Previous investors, including the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, will also participate, according to sources.

With more than 200 million accounts, Twitter, based in San Francisco, is part of an elite group of social Web start-ups that have flourished in recent years by rapidly attracting users. While peers like Groupon and Zynga are now hurtling toward the public markets, Twitter is holding back.

According to analysis, the company makes about $200 million a year from online advertising and is close to profitability.

By comparison, Zynga, the popular online gaming company, recorded $597.5 million in revenue last year, with a profit of $90.6 million, according to a recent regulatory filing. The company, which has filed to go public, is expected to offer its shares at a valuation near or above $20 billion, which amounts to around 33 times sales.

Founded in 2006, Twitter is also adjusting to a recent management reshuffling. Dick Costolo — a former Google executive who was Twitter’s chief operating officer — ascended to the chief executive job last October. Several months later, Jack Dorsey, who initially came up with the idea for Twitter and was its nonexecutive chairman, became head of product development.

Mr. Dorsey, who is also the chief executive of Square, a mobile payments start-up, has been working closely with Mr. Costolo to improve Twitter’s platform.

Despite its challenges, the company is attracting investor capital, at increasingly ambitious valuations.

In December, Twitter raised $200 million, from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Spark Capital, Benchmark Capital and Union Square Ventures. The investment back then valued the company at $3.7 billion.

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Russian billionaire investor Yuri Milner (pictured above) has bought a French chateau-style mansion in Silicon Valley for $100 million, making it among the most expensive single-family home sales in U.S. history, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The limestone mansion runs more than 30,000 square feet and has a ballroom, home theater, wine cellar, tennis courts and indoor and outdoor pools. It was completed around 2008, according to an architect who helped design the home, the Journal said.

Milner is CEO of Moscow-based Digital Sky Technologies, which has made large capital investments in Facebook Inc., GROUPON and “Farmville” game maker Zynga Inc., among others. Milner’s primary residence is still in Moscow, sources say he has no plans to move in the $100 Million Dollar Silicon Valley mansion anytime soon.