--Facebook buying mobile software developer Snaptu

Internet Business News
03-21-2011
--Facebook buying mobile software developer Snaptu

INTERNET BUSINESS NEWS-(C)1995-2011 M2 COMMUNICATIONS

21 March 2011 - Social networking champion Facebook is buying mobile software developer Snaptu, looking to grab a bigger portion of the mobile market, the Financial Times reported.
London-based Snaptu, which also has offices in Tel Aviv and Silicon Valley, stated in a blog posting that the deal should close in the next few weeks. The four-year-old company did not provide financial details but, according to Israeli media reports, the price is somewhere in the range of USD40m (EUR28m) to USD70m.

Facebook, which raised USD1.5bn from private investors in January, has placed mobile services at the top of its 2011 agenda.

Snaptu specialises in mobile applications for lower-end handsets, the so-called feature phones, which account for over 80% of global handset sales of five billion. This will help Facebook reach deeper into developing countries, where smartphones are beyond the means of most users.

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