Two buyers have reportedly emerged at the 11th hour as frontrunners for Myspace, with the ailing social networking site expected to axe possibly as many as 300 staff in the coming days.
Digital media company Specific Media and private equity firm Golden Gate Capital are being tipped to buy Myspace from News Corporation for between $20m (£12.5m) and $30m, according to US technology and digital media blog AllThingsD.
News Corp has been looking at the strategic options for Myspace since kicking off a review in February. News Corp bought Myspace for $580m in 2005 and would retain a small stake as part of the deal under discussion.
A wide number of potential buyers have been touted, the most recent favourite an investor group involving former chief executive of Activision Blizzard Bobby Kotick.
News Corp is said to be keen to tie up a deal by Thursday so that it can draw a line under the fate of the ailing social networking site before the end of its financial year on 30 June.
The company is also reportedly planning to cut a further 150 staff, out of a remaining 400, with another 150 put on a "transition" plan where they will be laid off but can "work with pay for a few weeks" while they job hunt, according to a report in the Washington Post.
While Specific Media and Golden Gate have emerged as 11th-hour frontrunners there remain other interested parties, including an investor group that includes Myspace co-founder Tom Anderson and Criterion Capital Partners, which bought AOL's Bebo social networking site and is poised to buy UK online TV service Seesaw.
In January Myspace cut 500 jobs, nearly half its workforce, and handed responsibility for UK advertising and sponsorship to News Corp company Fox Networks.
Facebook overtook Myspace as the leading social network in the US in May 2009, and that summer it cut about 1,100 jobs and closed some of its international offices.
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