AOL has injected tens of millions of dollars into The Huffington Post. Its audience has more than tripled from 25 million people before the AOL deal to 84 million at the end of October, according to comScore data. It has branched out to cover lifestyle, entertainment, business and technology, growing to 60 vertical sites from about 20, reports Reuters.
But The Huffington Post has yet to turn a profit for AOL, falling far short of Armstrong's projection at the time of the acquisition that the unit would post $66 million in operating profit in 2013 on $165 million in revenue. The Huffington Post will become more critical next year to AOL's hoped-for transformation into a digital media powerhouse.