Facebook today announced that it is acquiring Instagram, makers of the photo-sharing app of the same name. It will pay about US$1 billion in cash and company stock and is the company’s largest acquisition to date. According to Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook:
For years, we’ve focused on building the best experience for sharing photos with your friends and family. Now, we’ll be able to work even more closely with the Instagram team to also offer the best experiences for sharing beautiful mobile photos with people based on your interests.
We believe these are different experiences that complement each other. But in order to do this well, we need to be mindful about keeping and building on Instagram’s strengths and features rather than just trying to integrate everything into Facebook.
That’s why we’re committed to building and growing Instagram independently. Millions of people around the world love the Instagram app and the brand associated with it, and our goal is to help spread this app and brand to even more people.
Zuckerberg warns that Facebook is not about to go on a spending spree. Describing the acquisition as “an important milestone for Facebook”, he adds that there are no plans to do “many more of these, if any at all.”
The transaction, which is subject to customary closing conditions, is expected to close later this quarter.
Instragram just last week released an Android version of its popular iOS app. It recorded over 1 million downloads in the first 24 hours it was available.
Read more: Facebook