Quora, the Q&A site from Facebook veterans Adam D'Angelo and Charlie Cheever, is talking to venture capital firms about taking another round of funding, several sources tell us.
One source close to Quora tells us the startup has has rejected offers that would value the company at more than $300 million.
Quora raised $11 million at an $86 million valuation in March 2010 from Benchmark Capital and individual investors.
Quora is an incredibly hot startup – in the startup scene.
Silicon Valley heavyweights from Marc Andreessen to Marc Benioff to Mark Pincus hang out answering and asking questions on the site.
Google's head of design gushed about the site in December, saying it has "a very successful design, not only visually, but also for interaction in terms of how they have built in mechanics for ensuring high quality content."
"For a Q&A site, it didn’t turn into a Yahoo Answers with spammy answers. There’s a lot of really rich high quality content there. It’s one of my favorite sites to visit on a daily basis now."
Recently, big named people from the rest of the world started getting involved too.
Yesterday, Rick Warren, the very mainstream "real America" Christian minister from California, told his Twitter followers "I'm now using Quora to answer your questions that deserve longer answers than a DM."
The challenge Quora faces in the long term is keeping the quality of its content high as it expands beyond the borders of Silicon Valley and into the rest of the world – where people care more about Justin Bieber than Justin Schafer.
Answers.com is very popular with about 100 million global uniques, but it only sold for $127 million this month because its ad inventory is so cheap, thanks to its low-quality content.
One prominent investor we spoke to said this is why he's shocked to hear about Quora turning down $300 million valuations.
"I don't really buy it, but it might be enough if a "greater fool" like Google buys them for $2 billion."
One M&A source we talked to said, "Maybe someone thinks it's the next Twitter..."
Quora declined to comment on this story.
Related: Zuckerberg's Old Best Friend Poaches From Facebook, As Quora Hires A New Product Leader
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See Also:
- Check Out Cwora, The Hot Question And Answer Site
- Former AOL Chairman Steve Case Is Posting Like Crazy On Quora
- DEBATE: Is Quora Massively Overhyped?
Get Ready For A Huge Quora Round
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