Facebook: 300 million down, 6.5 billion to go

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Facebook was all smiles Tuesday and for good reason, reaching significant milestones in both user numbers and cash flow.

The social network, which passed 200 million active users worldwide in April and hit 250 million in July, announced that it had since added 50 million more fresh faces, cementing its position as the market leader and giving it a population that will soon surpass that of the United States.

Still, said CEO Mark Zuckerberg, that’s just a baby step on the way to the ultimate goal — world domination. “It’s a large number,” he said in a blog post, “but the way we think about this is that we’re just getting started on our goal of connecting everyone.”

While Facebook’s ability to attract users has never really been in question, its ability to make money has been, and Zuckerberg had good news on that front as well. “Earlier this year,” he wrote, “we said we expected to be cash flow positive sometime in 2010, and I’m pleased to share that we achieved this milestone last quarter. This is important to us because it sets Facebook up to be a strong independent service for the long term.” Being “cash flow positive” means non-investment revenue is enough to cover capital expenditures — just a step away from actual profitability.

This is all the more impressive because that revenue is being generated by a patchwork business model still in the formative stage — a mixture of self-service advertising, commerce in virtual goods, and an ad deal with Microsoft worth an estimated $150 million annually. The company is also working on a micropayments system that will eventually let it scrape off a percentage of on-site transactions. Even longtime doubters are starting to believe there may be a real business here.

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