Photo by Donnie Weatherhead

Coming off a turbulent 2012 in which it lost $650 million and laid off more than 10 percent of its D.C.-based workforce, the daily deals company LivingSocial received a bit of good financial news. In a memo to employees, LivingSocial CEO Tim O’Shaughnessy writes that the company recently received $110 million in new capital.

The money, O’Shaughnessy says, was contributed by LivingSocial’s board members and other current investors. “This investment is a tremendous vote of confidence in our business from the people who know us best,” he writes. “They have reviewed our plans for 2013, and they are enthusiastic enough to want to commit additional financial resources through this round.”

O’Shaugnessy also writes that LivingSocial has an “aggressive roadmap” to not just become profitable, but also expand once again. Before last year’s layoffs, which totaled 400 worldwide and 160 in D.C., the company had nearly 5,000 employees. O’Shaughnessy’s note was first reported by The Washington Post and later obtained by DCist.

LivingSocial’s previous expansions also contributed to the financial losses it took last year, particularly in the third quarter, when it saw companies it had acquired be devalued by $496 million and lost a total of $566 million. It ended the year with a $326 million deficit. Although LivingSocial is privately held, its quarterly and annual finances are public thanks to publicly traded Amazon, which owns a 29 percent stake of the company.

LivingSocial needs to be profitable by 2015 in order to receive the benefits of the $32.5 million tax incentive deal it received from the District government last year. O’Shaughnessy told his employees at a company-wide meeting last month that he expects LivingSocial to be turning a profit by the spring, a person who attended the meeting says.

O’Shaugnessy’s full memo:

LivingSocialites —

We’ve got some great news to announce today, as many of our current investors have reinforced their support for the company through a new round of financing that will give us an additional $110 million to build our reserves, solidify our long-term plans, and execute against our vision for the future.

This investment is a tremendous vote of confidence in our business from the people who know us best, our current board members and investors. They have reviewed our plans for 2013, and they are enthusiastic enough to want to commit additional financial resources through this round. This round also follows a competitive process in which we were fortunate enough to have multiple options for funding.

As you know from our all-hands last month, we have an aggressive roadmap for profitability and expansion this year, and those plans include increased investment in areas like marketing, technologies, and mobile. This new investment round will allow us to dedicate the resources we need, while also building a significant cash reserve against unanticipated events or bumps in the road.

This new investment does not change our plans to reach profitability, and we believe that a cash-flow positive and growing company will give us even deeper resources to take advantage of new opportunities, extend our promising lines of business, and expand a robust funnel of new customers. We will be sharing regular updates on our results and progress against goals as we move forward.

We’ve had a solid start to the year, and I am excited about the opportunity to solidify our path to success over the next couple months. Thank you again for your hard work and dedication.

– Tim

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Tim O’Shaughnessy
CEO
LivingSocial