Meta Inc. (META), the corporate which owns Facebook, the world’s largest social networking website, was based by CEO Mark Zuckerberg and several other Harvard College roommates in 2004. The firms identify initially was FaceMash, which was modified to TheFacebook, ultimately dropping “The” from its identity to turn out to be Facebook, earlier than being modified but once more to Meta in Oct. 2021.1 Zuckerberg and his co-founders initially launched the service for his or her Harvard classmates, rapidly increasing it to different universities after which to most of the people.
Meta has expanded far past its authentic social networking platform since its founding 16 years in the past. Its merchandise additionally embodies messenger providers, picture and video sharing, augmented actuality, and lots of different apps and providers.3 Acquisitions have been key to rising these companies and Meta’s income usually. Meta’s technique has been to purchase potential rivals earlier than they will get too massive. In this method, the corporate generally has paid exceptionally excessive costs for some offers.
Below, we glance in additional elements at Meta’s 5 greatest acquisitions. The firm doesn’t present a breakdown of how a lot of revenue or income every acquisition at the moment contributes to Meta.
- Type of Business: Photo and video-sharing app
- Acquisition Cost: $1.0 billion
- Acquisition Date: April 9, 2012, 5
Instagram is a photograph and video-sharing social networking platform that was launched in 2010. Through the Instagram app, customers can add, edit, and tag images and movies. The firm remained unbiased up till it was acquired by Meta for $1.0 billion in 2012. While Meta purchased Instagram because the photo-sharing firm was garnering important consideration from enterprise capital corporations and different buyers. Some estimates point out that Instagram generates extra promoting income than its mum or dad firm.
When it acquired Instagram, Meta opted to construct and develop the Instagram app independently from Meta’s foremost Facebook platform; Instagram stays a separate platform at present.5
The worth that Meta paid for Instagram, which at the moment was producing no income, displays Meta’s willingness to pay a premium for younger firms.
- Type of Business: Mobile messenger service
- Acquisition Cost: $19.0 billion
- Acquisition Date: February 19, 2014, 7
WhatsApp is a messenger and calling service accessible to customers all over the world. The platform was launched in 2009 as a low-cost various-to-plain textual content messaging provider. Throughout a lot of its historical past, WhatsApp has allowed customers to ship messages and make calls on to different customers for no value, no matter the location. Users also can ship images, movies, and paperwork over the platform. Meta purchased WhatsApp at a time when the smaller firm boasted greater than 400 million lively month-to-month customers, making it a fast-growing potential rival to the Facebook community platform.
When Meta bought WhatsApp, it was an unbiased firm that had lately been valued at $1.5 billion.9 Although it’s unclear precisely how a lot of income WhatsApp generates, some estimates are that WhatsApp income will likely be as excessive as $5 billion by 2020.
Oculus VR
- Type of Business: Virtual actuality know-how firm
- Acquisition Cost: $2.0 billion
- Acquisition Date: March 25, 2014, 7
Just weeks after saying its acquisition of WhatsApp, Meta adapted up by shopping for digital actuality {hardware} and software program firm Oculus VR. This firm was based in 2012 and is greatest identified for its Oculus Rift product, a digital actuality headset that was designed for video gaming. Since Facebook’s buy of Oculus VR in 2014, the subsidiary has made several acquisitions of its personnel. Perhaps probably the most outstanding was the 2015 buy of Surreal Vision, an organization specializing in 3D scene mapping reconstruction.10
At the time that Meta acquired Oculus VR, the corporate had solely produced an improvement prototype of what would turn out to be its widespread headset product. Meta’s buy of Oculus VR gave it an immediate presence within the digital actuality market at a time when builders had been displaying rising curiosity in VR.7
What Other Social Media Is Owned By Facebook
Onavo
- Type of Business: Mobile net analytics
- Acquisition Cost: $100–200 million (estimated)
- Acquisition Date: October 2013
Founded in 2010, Israeli firm Onavo performs net analytics on different cell apps to find out buyer utilization. Meta acquired Onavo in October 2013 for an undisclosed quantity that some analysts estimated to be between $100 million and $200 million.11 At the time of the acquisition, Onavo was an unbiased firm. Although Onavo isn’t one of Meta’s largest acquisitions, Onavo’s know-how could have allowed Meta to make essential early determinations about different firms and apps to accumulate. Onavo has often been categorized as spyware, forcing Meta to drag Onavo from each of the iOS and Android app shops in the face of criticism.12
Beluga
- Type of Business: Messaging service
- Acquisition Cost: Undisclosed
- Acquisition Date: March 2, 2011
Messaging app service Beluga, based in 2010, was acquired by Meta a yr later. Meta purchased Beluga within the midst of the startup’s fundraising course for an undisclosed sum. In shopping for Beluga, Facebook acquired the know-how that ultimately turned the social media firm’s extremely profitable Messenger platform. In the method, Meta once more expanded its choices and eradicated a possible rival.13
Facebook Diversity & Inclusiveness Transparency
As a part of our effort to improve the awareness of the importance of diversity in companies, we now have highlighted the transparency of Meta’s dedication to range, inclusiveness, and social duty. The chart illustrates how Meta reviews the range of its administration and workforce. This reveals that Meta discloses knowledge concerning the range of its board of administrators, C-Suite, common administration, and workers total, throughout quite a lot of markers. We have indicated that transparency with a ✔.
FAQs
Q: Does Zuckerberg personal Instagram?
A: Today Instagram is probably the most beneficial product of Facebook (rebranded as Meta). Mark Zuckerberg is the biggest shareholder in the firm. Zuckerberg retains possession and management of the corporate. Like Google, Facebook has issued two frequent shares, Class A and Class B.
Q: Is YouTube owned by Facebook?
A: It is owned by Google and is the second most visited website, after Google Search. YouTube has greater than 2.5 billion month-to-month customers, who collectively watch a couple of billion hours of movies every day. As of May 2019, movies had been being uploaded at a price of greater than 500 hours of content material per minute.
Q: Is Spotify owned by Facebook?
A: The multi-billion music streaming firm Spotify is primarily owned by its founders, Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. As of 2023, Daniel Ek has 16.5% possession of extraordinary shares and 31.7% of the voting energy. Martin Lorentzon has 10.9% of extraordinary shares and 42.6% of voting energy.
Q: What apps are underneath Meta?
A: Meta’s services embody Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Meta Quest. It has acquired Oculus, Mapillary, CTRL-Labs, and Kustomer, and has a 9.99% stake in Jio Platforms. In 2021, the corporate generated 97.5% of its income from the sale of promoting.
Q: Is Pinterest owned by Facebook?
A: No, Pinterest isn’t owned by Facebook. Pinterest is a publicly-traded firm. Co-founder and CEO Ben Silbermann is the biggest particular person Pinterest shareholder, proudly owning 7.89% of the corporate.
Q: Will Facebook purchase TikTok?
A: Facebook would not personal TikTok, and contemplating the regulatory warmth within the social media trade, it’d by no means. It already owns WhatsApp and Instagram, in addition to Oculus VR, which it acquired in 2014 for $2 billion.
