Bigfoot Ventures Acquires ChinesePod

Thank you very much! There's no HR changes at all as a result of this deal. They really like what the team has been doing.

Second the congrats, and I hope Jenny, John, Connie and the rest of the staff all got lots of stock options, golden handcuffs, platinum parachutes, lucrative non-compete deals, and all the other stuff that goes with a buyout.

Thanks a lot!

Thank you for your support!

No, we don't have any plans to increase prices on existing products.

one of the questions I sometimes asked vendors (in my prior life) about an acquisition was whether or not the customers were involved in making the case for acquiring the acquired vendor. Lo, these many moons later, it would been interesting to ask this of Cpod.

Hmmmm........

great question anyway pretz. Thanks for asking it :)

Yes, they did acquire all the other Pods. There're no changes planned to those sites.

There won't be disruption or changes to publication. But I think it's not so much about doing more or less of audio or video, but about what helps the learner most with what they are trying to achieve. That's the goal we are working towards.

Hank, the CEO of ChinesePod has stepped out of daily operations a while ago. I've been in senior management with our General Manager Kay Chen and Product Manager John Biesnecker for the past year or so. That's why I've been the one communicating the acquisition. The direction of the company is clear, to define a model that blends online, offline and media production to help Chinese learners worldwide. Bigfoot and we all believe that the current options are inadequate to provide the comprehensive support that a student needs to successfully learn Chinese. And this is what we are committed to doing in the future.

Thank you! I had the same reaction when I saw your comment about video too.

Actually, It should probably be said now: Jenny, John, Connie, Lujiaojie, Peter, and Greg and the rest of the cpod staff do a great job of interacting with us subscribers. They are the people that personalize the cpod site, make it interactive and a fun place to comment on and spend time on. But my questions are really best addressed by the CEO, Hank Horkoff. I'm not sure when/if he's going to weigh in this acquisition with us directly. So far, he's just commented on the press release. But in every other acquisition I've seen, its the CEO or direct senior staff responsible for the acquisition that communicates the future direction of the company to the customers in a acquisition.

I think expanding to video will be beneficial in many ways and in aspects that you can't anticipate.

I listen to many tech podcasts and thought audio was fine, until TWIT.tv and Revision3 went video I found myself watching video almost exclusively even though the content consists mostly of talking heads.

There is something to seeing the voices behind the microphones and based on the success the tech podcasts/vidcasts are having, I think a language learning podcast will benefit even more from video than talking newstech heads, especially given that production is so much cheaper now.

I hope what is being discussed is video IN ADDITION TO the current pdfs/mp3, rather than video WITH A FEW LESS mp3s/pdfs. And I hope we hear soon either way.

oh, and in all seriousness, congratulations, Jenny. I know CPod has been a labor of love for you for these years now, and I'm glad you were there all along to bring the company to this level. I hope you will be with us for many years to come. I'm looking forward to see what the expanded platform will be like.

wow, I just posted a comment saying I wish they would bring back video, and within a few hours they announce this deal. Talk about a responsive company!

I am certain video would be a massive boon - pronopunciation and visual memory are inter-linked. I think I mentioned the McGurk effect before, but the discussion went along the lines of - we are all lip readers, whether we are aware of it or not.

I am more excited about people speaking to camera, than vocab tours (which were great) or magazine content!

Video! YAAAYYY! :)

I think this news can only be positive. Good luck guys.

Take a look at their media productions http://www.bigfoot.com/

"They've invited us to their film studios for future content production. It means doing more exciting things"

hey that is exciting. I can't wait. Not had a chance to read the link, but it's sounding like a great opportunity. Hard to imagine how CPod could be any better, but you guys are so innovative and cutting edge that I'm really looking forward to see what the investment of funds can bring. Yeah, sounds like congratulations are in order. gongxi gongxi . Thanks for always stepping it up and keeping us interested and motivated and finding new ways to help us learn in such a fun way. Jiayou. :)

We haven't got into the details on that yet. But we all feel that we should use videos for things that really need a visual component to such as learning characters. And with tablets being a top device now, it makes a compelling case to do some video lessons.

Thanks for the reply. So it sounds like new lesson creation will increase, to include video in addition to the audio/pdf content?

Bigfoot and we passionately share the vision of combining online, offline and media production. They've invited us to their film studios for future content production. It means doing more exciting things. BTW, the founder of Bigfoot Michael Gleissner is an entrepreneur at heart. He's been encouraging us to think bigger and more since the beginning of our discussions.

After a casual review of Bigfoot's portfolio, it looks like there's going to be some cross-sell/up-sell opportunities between cpod subscribers and New Concept Mandarin schools; maybe the opportunity for cpodders to attend a couple of weeks free at a New Concept Mandarin school or something?

ganxie Jenny :)

Thank you Baba. You've been such a tremendous support over the years. It's greatly appreciated.