Spanfeller Nears $2M in Funding for Web Startup

After leaving Forbes.com as CEO last summer, Jim Spanfeller’s initial plan was to launch a media management firm to manage publishers’ Web sites and to take an equity stake in those businesses. Since then, Spanfeller has switched gears, aiming now to launch the Spanfeller Media Group, an online publishing startup for which he will serve as president and CEO.

“Too many moving parts between different business models,” Spanfeller [pictured] says of drifting away from his original advising plan.

The new venture is looking to lock up a financing round that is reportedly worth $2 million. Spanfeller says that figure “is in the right vicinity” but declined to get any more specific as the process is still ongoing (it is expected to close sometime next week). The investment group has been led by Softbank and includes RRE Ventures, Greenhill SAVP and Lerer Media Ventures.

Spanfeller Media Group’s first project is to launch a Web site about food. “I am not fully ready to talk positioning just yet but rest assured we have one,” Spanfeller says of the forthcoming site. Spanfeller says the group has plans to launch another site later on in “a different as yet to be determined category.”

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