• TechCrunch, Tuesday, April 14, 2009 11:30 AM

In September, TechCrunch reported that eBay was trying to sell off StumbleUpon, the Web site recommendation service purchased by the online auctioneer for $75 million in 2007. That never happened, but yesterday, a group led by the company's original founders managed to buy back the firm to begin life anew as an independent startup. TechCrunch's MG Siegler has the scoop.

StumbleUpon will now be led by co-founder Garrett Camp, who assumes the role of CEO. Geoff Smith, another of its founders, also returns in an unannounced role. Its investors include Sherpalo Ventures, Accel Partners and August Capital. David Hornik from August Capital and Sameer Gandhi of Accel will join the company's board.

"The company is amply funded. And everyone is glad that the company is away from eBay." a source tells Siegler, who notes that eBay had previously been looking for $75 million for StumbleUpon, but likely sold out for significantly less. It's unclear whether eBay retains a stake in the company, but that seems likely, Siegler says, given that a sale at a lower price would be a bad piece of business for eBay. Meanwhile, StumbleUpon's traffic has been falling. According to comScore, in February 2008 the site had 2.6 million unique users. A year later it had just 1.4 million.

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