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Facebook buys Reliance Jio 9.9% Stake for $5.7 billion

22Apr By AdityaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Facebook buys Reliance Jio 9.9% Stake for $5.7 billion

Facebook announced an acquisition of a 9.9% stake in India's largest telecom operator Jio Platforms Ltd for USD 5.7 billion (Rs 43,574 crore). With this deal, the social media giant looks to expand its presence in its largest subscriber-based market. "Today, we are announcing a USD 5.7 billion, or Rs 43,574 crore, investment in Jio Platforms Limited, part of Reliance Industries Limited, making Facebook its largest minority shareholder," the fb said in a statement. Facebook's move to pick up about a 10 percent stake in Jio Platforms will accelerate Jio's digital monetization drive and put Reliance Industries (RIL) on course to turn net debt-free by March 2021, said Indian analysts. It said that Facebook's investment into this entity will further Reliance Industries' digital ini...

Zuckerberg Philanthropic Arm Pledges USD 25M to Fund Researching COVID-19 Treatments

29Mar By AnkitaNo Comments

News

Zuckerberg Philanthropic Arm Pledges USD 25M to Fund Researching COVID-19 Treatments

The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, the philanthropic arm of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan, has announced plans to team up with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to donate USD 25 million to a research fund exploring possible COVID-19 treatments. "I'm really proud to share that (The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative is) going to be joining Gates and others to put together something they're calling the therapeutics accelerator to fight coronavirus," Chan told "CBS This Morning" co-host Gayle King. Chan told King that their goal is "to fund a group to screen all the drugs that we know have potential effects against coronavirus."Zuckerberg said one drug can often be used to treat multiple diseases. "You can basically take all those drugs that have already been ...

Facebook Looking to Acquire 10% Stake in India’s leading Telecom Company

25Mar By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Facebook Looking to Acquire 10% Stake in India’s leading Telecom Company

Facebook Inc is in talks to acquire stake India's leading telecom company Reliance Jio, according to a report published in Financial Times. The report said the social media giant was in talks for a 10% stake in Jio, controlled by India's wealthiest man Mukesh Ambani, but the talks were halted due to global travel bans amid the coronavirus outbreak. According to previous reports, Reliance Jio's enterprise value was estimated to be around $60-65 billion in October 2019 following the company's future plan to clear all its debt till March 2021. Reliance Jio had a subscriber market share of 32.1 percent and a revenue market share of 35.4 percent in December 2019 as per previous reports. Recently, Reliance had restructured the digital businesses to bring it under a single entity in ...

Unacademy Raises USD 110 mn Led by Facebook & Others

20Feb By NitishNo Comments

FUNDING

Unacademy Raises USD 110 mn Led by Facebook & Others

Online education platform Unacademy raises USD 110 million (about Rs 780 crore) in a funding round led by social media major Facebook and General Atlantic. The funding round saw investment from fresh investors including Sequoia India, Nexus Venture Partners, Steadview Capital and Blume Ventures, Flipkart CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy and Udaan co-founder Sujeet Kumar, according to a company statement. 'We are seeing great learning outcomes through our subscription where learners can take live classes by these educators. We now have more than 90,000 active subscribers. We thank General Atlantic and Facebook who have joined us in this journey and our existing investors who continue to be a part of the journey by supporting us,' Unacademy co-founder Gaurav Munjal said. In addition to rais...

Facebook Acquire AI Location Accuracy Startup Scape Technologies

10Feb By AdityaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Facebook Acquire AI Location Accuracy Startup Scape Technologies

Facebook has acquired computer vision start-up Scape Technologies. The deal for London-based Scape could be around $40M, according to the report, and it says filings indicate that Facebook has more than 75% of the company. They also indicate that VC representatives on Scape's board have been replaced by two Facebook execs. Scape allows developers to build apps that call for location accuracy better than that offered by GPS, using a "visual positioning service." While it focused initially on augmented reality, Scape is looking to enable any camera to understand its surroundings." "Rather than rely on 3D maps built and stored locally, Scape's visual engine builds and references 3D maps on the cloud, allowing devices to tap into a ‘shared understanding’ of an environment. The ...

Facebook Acquires Video Gaming Company PlayGiga

19Dec By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Facebook Acquires Video Gaming Company PlayGiga

Social media giant Facebook has acquired cloud based video gaming firm PlayGiga. The deal value has not been disclosed but according to Spain, local business newspaper Facebook acquired PlayGiga for about $78 million. “We’re thrilled to welcome PlayGiga to the Facebook Gaming team. We are continuing our work in cloud gaming, now with a new mission. We want to thank all of our partners and customers for their support over the years ” a Facebook spokesperson said in a press note on its website. Founded in 2013, PlayGiga enables users to play premium videogames on PC / Mac or TV through an affordable monthly subscription. The social networking giant has also launched Facebook Gaming -- a live-stream service that allows users to share their gameplay. The arrival of Cloud-based...

Adobe Acquires Oculus VR Tool Medium from Facebook

9Dec By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Adobe Acquires Oculus VR Tool Medium from Facebook

In one of the biggest development in the VR industry, Social media platform Facebook-owned virtual reality firm Oculus sell-off its 3D sculpting tool 'Medium' to Adobe. The size of the deal has not been disclosed yet. Launched in 2016, Medium enables users to build their own 3D models in a VR, where you can sculpt, paint and simulate action and with Adobe’s support, Medium will be able to better help creators thrive and shape their 3D visions than ever before. The move of selling the Oculus tool surprised everyone but according to sources of Pixr8, maintaining the Medium team was becoming too expensive for Facebook given that Oculus had pumped in a lot of money in its tool. Also, the deal from Adobe was lucrative that Facebook can't refuse. As per the statement, the Oc...

27Nov By AdityaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Facebook Acquire VR Studio ‘Beat Games’

Facebook-owned Oculus is buying the studio behind hit virtual reality game "Beat Saber" as it looks to expand VR technology to wider audiences. Oculus, which makes Rift and Quest VR headgear, did not disclose financial terms of the deal to acquire Prague-based Beat Games. "Beat Games is joining us in our quest to bring VR to more people around the world," Oculus director of augmented and virtual reality content Mike Verdu said in a blog post. "Beat Games' accomplishments are already impressive, but Facebook and the Beat Games team know that there is so much more that can be done across VR, games, and music." Verdu assured players that the studio would continue to ship content and updates for "Beat Saber" on platforms where it is already available. In the virtual game, player...

Facebook Launched Unified Payment System for Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp

13Nov By AdityaNo Comments

News

Facebook Launched Unified Payment System for Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp

San Francisco, Nov 12: Zuckerberg led Facebook said it is consolidating the system that handles payments at the social network and in its family of messaging apps. The move comes in a climate of political rhetoric that includes calling for the California-based internet company to be broken up. Transactions such as payments or donations at Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp or the main social network will eventually be handled by a unified Facebook Pay system, according to marketplace and commerce vice president Deborah Liu. "People already use payments across our apps to shop, donate to causes and send money to each other," Liu said in an online post. "Facebook Pay will make these transactions easier while continuing to ensure your payment information is secure and protected." Fac...

Facebook Profit Climbs Even After Criticism over Data

1Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

News

Facebook Profit Climbs Even After Criticism over Data

31st Oct, 2019-- Leading Social media platform Facebook reported that its profit topped $6 billion on revenue that climbed 28 percent to $17.4 billion in the quarter that ended on September 30. Meanwhile, the number of active monthly users increased eight percent from a year ago to 2.45 billion. "We had a good quarter and our community and business continue to grow," said Facebook chief and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg. "We are focused on making progress on major social issues and building new experiences that improve people's lives around the world."Facebook shares rose more than four percent in after-market trades that followed the release of the earnings figures, which beat Wall Street expectations. "Advertisers continue to support Facebook, despite the many controversies swirlin...

Facebook Acquires Startup Working on to control Computers Using Brain

24Sep By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Facebook Acquires Startup Working on to control Computers Using Brain

Facebook acquires a startup working on ways to command computers or other devices using brain thought instead of taps, swipes, or keystrokes. CTRL-labs will become part of Facebook Reality Labs with an aim at perfecting the technology and getting it into consumer products, according to Andrew Bosworth, vice president of augmented and virtual reality at the California-based social network. "We know there are more natural, intuitive ways to interact with devices and technology," Bosworth said in a post at Facebook announcing the acquisition. "And we want to build them. The vision for this work is a wristband that lets people control their devices as a natural extension of movement." Bosworth explained that the wristband will decode electrical impulses such as those sent to ha...

9Aug By PriyankaNo Comments

News

Facebook Offering Millions for News Publishing

Facebook is reportedly in talks with news publishers to offer "millions of dollars" for the rights to publish their material on its site. The move follows years of criticism over its growing monopolization of online advertising to the detriment of the struggling news industry. The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Facebook representatives had told news executives that they'd pay as much as USD 3 million a year to license stories, headlines, and other material. Facebook declined to comment but confirmed that the company is working on launching a "news tab" for its service this fall. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg began talking about a news section on the service in April. A person familiar with the matter confirmed that Facebook has approached News Corp. about paying to lic...