Facebook has big plans and hopes to settle a deal with the photo sharing website, Instagram, by the end of June this year. Facebook has offered to purchase the software company Instagram for a hefty bid of $1 billion. This will be the largest acquisition by the social networking giant Facebook.
What is instagram
Instagram allows users to join the site and share photos taken with their mobile devices, mainly smartphones. There are multiple filters that can be applied to make the images appear like they were taken by a Polaroid camera or Kelvin style camera or in the 1970’s.
This week Instagram finally released the much anticipated Android app for the android. The iPhone has had a great deal of success with users.
Facebook’s Plans With Instagram
Facebook plans to allow Instagram to run independently as it currently does. Instagram users will still be allowed to post their images on competing social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Email, Flickr, Tumblr, Posterous, and Foursquare. There may be additional sites added in the near future, but that have not been disclosed. There is also a way to geotag your photos with your location.
This is a large change from the typical acquisition strategy Facebook has used in the past. Typically Facebook purchases small stat-up companies and then integrates the technology with their social networking site or shut it down altogether.
Facebook will pay for the purchase in cash and Facebook stock. The initial public offering (IPO) of stock should be finalized next month in May / June. By June of this year the deal should be finalized and Facebook will own the photo sharing site Instagram.
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