Legendary venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield &038' Byers sat out most of the recent social networking craze, but ita4‚¬a4„s been catching up quickly over the past year. And the latest addition is Facebook, the social networking crown jewel.

Kleiner is buying as much as $38 million in Facebook stock from other shareholders (which usually means employees and early investors) at a $52 billion valuation, according to a report in the Wall Street Journala4‚¬a4„s Venture Capital Dispatch. Thata4‚¬a4„s slightly higher than the companya4‚¬a4„s $50 billion valuation when it raised $1.5 billion from Goldman Sachs, DST, and Goldman clients in January.

The firm appears to be taking a similar strategy to another big-name firm, Andreessen Horowitz &8212' since they missed out on most of the social networking superstars early on, theya4‚¬a4„re willing to put a lot more money into them now, at tremendous valuations. And if they cana4‚¬a4„t invest directly, theya4‚¬a4„re willing to buy shares on the secondary markets. For example, last fall Kleiner led a $200 million round in Twitter that valued the company at $3.6 billion. Andreessen Horowitz didna4‚¬a4„t participate in that round, but it recently purchased more than $80 million in Twitter stock from existing shareholders.

Kleiner was less active on the social Web (with the notable exception of an investment in social gaming giant Zynga) until last year, due to its funding of Friendster and a focus on cleantech investments. Now, however, in addition to these bigger deals the firm has been investing in what it hopes will be the next wave of social networking hits through its sFund, which Facebook has also invested in. (In the photo above, Kleiner partners John Doerr and Bing Gordon bookend a lineup of sFund participants including Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.) In fact, Kleiner and Andreessen Horowitz are the two firms that have a stake in Facebook, Twitter, Zynga, and Groupon.

Next Story: Netflix finally lands on the Boxee Box Previous Story: HP snaps up real-time data management provider Vertica

Print Email Twitter Facebook Google Buzz LinkedIn Digg StumbleUpon Reddit Delicious Google More&8230'

Companies: Facebook, Kleiner Perkins Caufield &' Byers

People: Bing Gordon, John Doerr, Mark Zuckerberg

Companies: Facebook, Kleiner Perkins Caufield &' Byers

People: Bing Gordon, John Doerr, Mark Zuckerberg

Anthony is a senior editor at VentureBeat, as well as its reporter on media, advertising, and social networks. Before joining the site in 2008, Anthony worked at the Hollister Free Lance, where he won awards from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for breaking news coverage and writing. He attended Stanford University and now lives in San Francisco. Reach him at anthony@venturebeat.com. (All story pitches should also be sent to tips@venturebeat.com) You can also follow Anthony on Twitter.

Have news to share Launching a startup Email: tips@venturebeat.com

VentureBeat has new weekly email newsletters. Stay on top of the news, and don't miss a beat.