Apple has acquired social media analytics firm Topsy Labs for over $200 million, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal, citing “people familiar with the matter”.
Topsy made headlines a few months ago when it launched a new search engine for Twitter, indexing every public tweet and making them searchable.
Apple only confirmed the acquisition with its typical canned statement: “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.”
The company has been on something of an acquisition spree lately. Last week, news came out that the company acquired PrimeSense. Other recent acquisitions include Cue (formerly Greplin), AlgoTrim, Matcha and Embark.
It’s unclear what exactly Apple has in mind with the Topsy acquisition, but one thing worth noting for those interested in the search industry, is that Topsy has access to the Twitter firehose, and can therefore deliver on realtime search. Google no longer does this, and now one of its chief rivals has that search power in its clutches.
Image: Topsy