Facebook has bought Instagram for a massive $1bn (£629m). The popular photo-sharing smartphone app crossed its tipping point last year. Learning from the experience of the sluggish response to Twitter, Facebook has acted in a way that’s fast, determined and retains its leadership in photosharing.
Launched less than two years ago in October 2010, Instagram is a free appm that lets users apply 17 filters to the pictures they take – changing the colour balance to give the images a different feel – before they are uploaded.
The firm has more than 30 million users uploading more than 5 million new pictures every day.
Facebook’s chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has pledged to continue to develop Instagram as a separate brand, allowing it to post to rival networks.
Zuckerberg wrote on his Facebook page: “We think the fact that Instagram is connected to other services beyond Facebook is an important part of the experience. We plan on keeping features like the ability to post to other social networks, the ability to not share your Instagrams on Facebook if you want, and the ability to have followers and follow people separately from your friends on Facebook.”
He added: “This is an important milestone for Facebook because it’s the first time we’ve ever acquired a product and company with so many users. We don’t plan on doing many more of these, if any at all.”
Its creators, Stanford graduates Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger now stand to share the best part of $1billion that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg paid for their creation.
Systrom, 28, actually turned down the chance to join Facebook in 2004. He will still own around 40 per cent of the photo-sharing software company.
On the company blog, Systrom wrote how he and his team are ‘psyched’ about the deal.
He also reassured users that Facebook would not stop the Instagram app – instead it will continue to exist independently of Facebook.
“Instagram is not going away,” he wrote. !We’ll be working with Facebook to evolve Instagram and build the network.
‘We’ll continue to add new features to the product and find new ways to create a better mobile photos experience. The Instagram app will still be the same one you know and love. We’re psyched to be joining Facebook and are excited to build a better Instagram for everyone.”
Facebook is paying $1bn (£629m) in cash and stock for the takeover.
The deal marks the second time in four months that Facebook has taken on staff from another social network.
In December, it announced it was hiring the co-founders of the location-based check-in service Gowalla. The network closed down shortly afterwards.
The moves come ahead of Facebook’s planned flotation later this year. The firm reportedly plans to issue $5bn worth of stock on the New York-based Nasdaq exchange in May or June. The deal could value the firm as being worth as much as $100bn.
