Over the years, Facebook has purchased a lot of companies and apps for billions of dollars. The most notable has to be Instagram for $1 billion in 2012 and Whatsapp for $19 billion in 2014.
Now, Facebook announced that it had acquired the popular GIF sharing platform GIPHY. GIPHY will be joining the Facebook company as a part of the Instagram team.
Facebook Buys GIPHY for $400 Million
GIPHY is a popular online community that lets you share short looping videos. Now, Facebook plans to integrate the immense GIF library into Instagram and other Facebook-owned apps. And Facebook reportedly paid $400 million to acquire the company.
Instagram’s VP of product, Vishal Shah, announced the news in a blog post on May 15. He said that 50% of traffic GIPHY gets comes from Facebook and its other apps. And half of that is from Instagram alone. “By bringing Instagram and GIPHY together, we can make it easier for people to find the perfect GIFs and stickers in Stories and Direct,” says Shah.
He said that Instagram is looking forward to investing more in technology and relationship with API partners and the content of GIPHY. Shah further adds, “GIPHY’s creative community will still be able to create great content.”
GIPHY Shares the Announcement
GIPHY also wrote a blog post announcing that it is joining the Facebook family as an Instagram team member. The company shared the post thanking their team members, supporters, partners, and both the hard and soft G defenders.
GIPHY shares, “The dogs wearing sunglasses, the excited goats, the chill lizards, the surprised pandas, the hamsters eating tiny burritos…and, of course, the cats. Every single cat.”
