WhatsApp was valued at just $1.5 billion in final round of funding

When Facebook pushed its offer of $16 billion onto the table to acquire WhatsApp, the company's founders would've had their hearts drop - in utter surprise because its last funding round had them pegged at a value of around $1.5 billion.

In WhatsApp final round of funding, which took place in July last year, it secured $52 million from a valuation of around $1.5 billion. WhatsApp grew exponentially between July 2013 and just a few days ago when it was acquired by Facebook for $16 billion in stocks and cash. The sole investor in WhatsApp, Sequoia, owned around 20% of the company, which is now worth a cool $3 billion.

At $3 billion, Sequoia has seen an amazing 50x return in its investment in WhatsApp... something that nobody could complain about, that's for sure.