Facebook Buying WhatsApp for $16B in Cash and Stock Plus $3B in RSUs

Post by redthrowaway » Wed, Feb 19, 2014, 10:43 PM UTC

nwh wrote: post #60

400,000,000 active users [0] 16,000,000,000 USD ---- $40 per user That's an incredible cost. We can assume Facebook is paying for the userbase, the app itself and it's infrastructure would basically run itself. It's less appealing when you realise that there's probably a miniscule fraction of WhatsApp users that don't have a Facebook account. > WhatsApp will remain autonomous and operate independently. You can contin…

Post by mahyarm » Wed, Feb 19, 2014, 10:44 PM UTC

johngalt wrote: post #148

huskyr wrote: post #132

Facebook suddenly acquired the world's (if we exclude the US and China) most popular messaging service. I communicate with this app with all my friends, and share stuff that i have no intention of ever putting on Facebook. Everything that once seemed 'private' is now in the hands of a website that forces it users to share as much as possible with marketeers and advertising companies. It's gonna be one tough mission f…

The closest option is XMPP. Unfortunately it's suffered an extreme case of scope creep. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XMPP

Post by peteforde » Wed, Feb 19, 2014, 10:44 PM UTC

TylerE wrote: post #141

josh2600 wrote: post #104

For everyone saying this is a waste of money, consider the commentary around Instagram at $1B. Basically the world said that this was a horrible acquisition at the time, but in retrospect, buying Instagram was quite cheap. Buying your closest competitor for less than 15% of your market cap is usually a good idea. Fast forward to today. What'sapp is the dominant messaging application across the world. Carriers hate it…

I'm not sure that sort of relativism makes sense. Making a really bad purchase doesn't make your earlier merely bad purchases less bad.

Post by dfjorque » Wed, Feb 19, 2014, 10:44 PM UTC

gamegoblin wrote: post #11

That is a LOT of money. That being said, I use WhatsApp every day to chat with my friends around the world and it's really excellent. I know it's used a lot in other parts of the world even more, so I doubt this purchase is focused on US markets. It seems that every one of my Arab friends uses WhatsApp to talk to their families back home (and they use it at home, too). I don't know about other regions.

Post by cemregr » Wed, Feb 19, 2014, 10:45 PM UTC

shurcooL wrote: post #84

skeletonjelly wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no Facebook fan, but this isn't entirely true is it? I mean Instagram has pretty much stayed the same. It gained a video feature. Otherwise the same?

They ruined Divvy after buying it.