Mike Isaac at Recode:
Facebook plans to acquire the messaging service WhatsApp, the company announced on Wednesday.
The move marks the social giant’s biggest acquisition to date, as Facebook paid $16 billion in cash and stock for the company. In addition, the deal includes another $3 billion in restricted stock units for WhatsApp employees, which will vest over a period of time.
WhatsApp’s numbers speak for themselves. The company has more than 450 million monthly active users on the platform, according to the company, with more than 70 percent of users returning to the app on a daily basis.
Ridiculous amount of money, sure, but also WhatsApp’s growth and stats are incredibly impressive.
If we’re talking recent acquisitions, the deal is worth: 2.2 Nokias, 5.5 Motorola Mobilitys, 5 Nests or 16 Instagrams.
Here’s a post from Mark Zuckerberg on his Facebook wall, providing some more details about the deal:
WhatsApp will complement our existing chat and messaging services to provide new tools for our community. Facebook Messenger is widely used for chatting with your Facebook friends, and WhatsApp for communicating with all of your contacts and small groups of people. Since WhatsApp and Messenger serve such different and important uses, we will continue investing in both and making them each great products for everyone.
WhatsApp has also weighed in on the acquisition at their blog, stating:
WhatsApp will remain autonomous and operate independently. You can continue to enjoy the service for a nominal fee. You can continue to use WhatsApp no matter where in the world you are, or what smartphone you’re using. And you can still count on absolutely no ads interrupting your communication. There would have been no partnership between our two companies if we had to compromise on the core principles that will always define our company, our vision and our product.
WhatsApp only has about 55 employees, so Facebook paid around $345 million per employee. Those guys are going to be rich.