Automattic, the company that operates WordPress.com, has acquired Beeper. As you may recall, Beeper is the company that briefly brought iMessage to Android, much to the chagrin of Apple. The move comes as Automattic aims to become an all-in-one solution for cross-platform messaging.
The deal was announced on Tuesday. Automattic will acquire the company for $125 million and absorb its 27 employees, as reported by Bloomberg. Beeper co-founder Eric Migicovsky is also joining Automattic and will serve as the company’s “head of messaging.”
Speaking to Bloomberg, Migicovsky explained that Beeper’s fight with Apple is one of the things that brought more awareness to the company’s mission:
“There’s basically no open standard for chat, and our vision is to create that by connecting to legacy chat networks,” Migicovsky said in an interview.
Migicovsky said the fight with Apple “helped bring more awareness and attention to Beeper and validated that we need to know who our friends were in the space.” The app is exiting its beta phase as part of the deal, making it available to anyone.
“Automattic is a big company but they’re not like a Big Tech company,” he said. “They know how to build open-source infrastructure to open-source the internet.”
The acquisition of Beeper aligns with Automattic’s goal of developing an all-in-one chat app. Back in October, the company also acquired the “Texts” inbox messaging app.
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