Facebook has bought Giphy, popularly known as the “Google for GIFs,” as announced by the company in a statement. The great platform and its collection of animated images will become part of the Facebook family after the purchase agreement. As Axios has advanced, with a value of 400 million dollars .
According to sources close to the agreement, the two companies started negotiations before the pandemic, but what was initially focused as a partnership has ended up becoming an acquisition.
Giphy was founded in 2013 by Alex Chung and Jace Cooke. With more than 700 million active users and more than 10 billion GIFs sent daily, the platform will be the newest member of the Facebook family, additionally made up of other services such as WhatsApp or Instagram.
Giphy will be integrated into Instagram
Giphy will be integrated as part of the Instagram team and according to the company, the intention is to integrate the search for GIFs on Instagram. Mark Zuckerberg’s company explains that 50% of Giphy’s traffic already comes from Facebook apps and Instagram alone accounted for half. Users will be able to join Instagram and Giphy in the future to be able to share GIFs and stickers, both in stories and in direct messages.
Currently, Instagram already allows you to add animated GIFs to Instagram stories. The GIF platform will continue to operate its library and both users and developers using its API will be able to continue using GIFs.
Giphy will keep its existing integrations with other applications like Twitter or messaging applications like Signal. An additional tool to know the use that users make of other platforms outside their services. We will have to wait what decision these developers make about it and if they maintain their integration with Giphy.
From Signal they explain that “GIF searches in Signal have been protected by a proxy that preserves privacy from the beginning. The Giphy SDK is not included in the application.”
According to Giphy’s latest valuation in 2016 , the GIF platform was worth $ 600 million.
More information | Facebook | Giphy
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