Social media tools maker Jive trying to sell itself - tech blog

REUTERS - Shares in Jive Software Inc (JIVE.O), a maker of social media tools for companies, rose 7 percent after a technology blog reported that the company has been seeking a buyer for months.

Jive has hired Qatalyst Partners, the investment bank led by Silicon Valley dealmaker Frank Quattrone, to find a buyer, the blog Re/Code reported, citing sources. (http://r.reuters.com/sum57v)

Jive approached Oracle Corp (ORCL.N), SAP AG (SAPG.DE) and Workday Inc (WDAY.N), but was rebuffed by them, the sources told the blog.

Jive said it did not comment on rumors. Oracle, Workday and SAP were not immediately available for comment.

Palo Alto, California-based Jive sells social networking software that allows collaboration, microblogging and community messaging.

Sequoia Capital is the company's largest shareholder with a stake of about 20 percent, while Chief Technology Officer and co-founder Matt Tucker owns 9 percent.

Jive's rivals include Salesforce.com's (NYS:CRM) Chatter, Microsoft Corp's (MSFT.O) Yammer and VMWare Inc's (NYS:VMW) Socialcast.

Jive, which went public in 2011 and is yet to report a profit, forecast current-quarter revenue below analysts' estimates.

The forecast prompted Morgan Stanley to downgrade the company's stock to "equal weight" from "overweight" and at least two brokerages cut their price targets on the stock, citing slowing customer growth.

Shares of Jive, which has a market value of about $584 million, were up 6.3 percent at $8.84 in early afternoon trading on the Nasdaq. The stock has lost half its value over the past year.

(Reporting by Edwin Chan and Soham Chatterjee; Editing by Kirti Pandey)