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Facebook to Buy WhatsApp for 16 Billion

posted by Dopefish on Thursday February 20 2014, @09:00AM   Printer-friendly
from the when-will-this-darn-bubble-pop-already? dept.

lubricus writes "Facebook announced plans to acquire WhatsApp for four billion cash, plus 12 billion in Facebook shares.

Additionally, WhatsApp employees and founders will receive three billion in restricted stock which will vest in four years. Facebook also agreed to a one billion dollar break up fee.

WhatsApp says they have message volume which approaches the global SMS volume, and hope to have one billion users. Even at those figures, Facebook is paying $16 per user.

I'm guessing WhatsApp will send Snapchat developers a cake."

 
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  • (Score: 1) by zeigerpuppy on Friday February 21 2014, @12:50AM

    by zeigerpuppy (1298) on Friday February 21 2014, @12:50AM (#3922)

    Jabber is the open protocol. It has a lot of good clients.
    I run jabber on a Debian server and use BeeJive (iOS) as a client.
    It is a nice light solution and doesn't hog too much battery when running.

    This purchase by Facebook is about name and users, not tech.