BusinessWeek: Interview With Bill Gates And Steve Davis Of Corbis; Analyst Expects $2 Billion Market To Grow In The Mid-Teens Percent In 2006

The BusinessWeek runs a long article today about Corbis (Content is King at Corbis) and an interview with Bill Gates and Steve Davis in this matter (Bill Gates Pictures Corbis' Future):

Gates noted in the interview:

Question: The explosion of digital photography, combined with the Internet, makes it possible for millions of people to share photos and videos via Web sites like Flickr and BitTorrent. Is there a role for Corbis in this citizen-creator phenomenon?

Gates: Most of what we get is done by professional photographers. We do have partners who are in the spot-news business, who create the stuff people need right away. We're good at archiving and organizing it, so we take that material and make it available. You could have some amateur work come in through the spot-news channel. It will be like it is with e-zines and bloggers. In photography, you'll have the whole array of stuff that's just up there free, and then increasing levels of quality. The whole spectrum is being figured out.

BusinessWeek writes in the article:

A year ago, finishing off a year when revenue rose 20%, Corbis' leaders confidently predicted that they would turn the company profitable. That didn't happen. Instead, organic revenue growth slowed to 4%, though overall growth topped 34%. The total take was $228 million, thanks to the company's mergers and acquisitions spree. (Getty Images grew 17.9% to $733.7 million, mostly organically, and pulled in $150 million in profits.)

Corbis Chief Financial Officer Sue McDonald said at the meeting that the goal is to become profitable this year, and that additional acquisitions won't be necessary to achieve growth goals. When asked about the possibility of an initial share sale, Chief Executive Steve Davis said the plan is to diversify ownership. He and Gates are considering strategic investors as an alternative to taking the company public.

Analyst James Ballan of Bear Stearns, who follows Getty, says, "Corbis is obviously going through a restructuring, and [it's] doing a lot of work internally." While he expects the $2 billion market to grow in the mid-teens percent this year, Corbis' prospects aren't clear.

Tags: Corbis; Bill Gates; Steve Davis; Flickr; BitTorrent