• The Wall Street Journal, Wednesday, July 6, 2011 10:53 AM

While Web darlings like Groupon and Zynga file their IPOs, Twitter is reportedly planning to raise another round of private funding. "The round could yield hundreds of millions and value Twitter as high as $7 billion," The Wall Street Journal reveals, citing a single source. As yet, it remains unclear which investors are participating in this latest new round.

The talks come just seven months after Twitter raised $200 million in a financing led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, which valued the company at $3.7 billion. "Twitter's new valuation underscores the soaring price tags for some Web companies," writes WSJ.

Meanwhile, "By trying to raise a large slug of money, Twitter buys itself more time to develop an advertising-based business that is relatively immature compared to its peers." Indeed, "Twitter is still evolving its business model," Tony Florence, a partner with venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates, tells WSJ. "Staying private while you are figuring out your model makes a lot of sense."

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