LinkedIn has confirmed it has acquired the Pulse smartphone and tablet application, which brings in custom news updates from sources across the web.
The social network has paid a reported $90m (£58.4m) for the app, which has long been considered one of the best news aggregators available for iOS and Android devices.
The app allows users to prioritise which sources they wish to receive news updates from and showcases the updates in an attractive, picture-based, horizontal user interface.
The deal, which had been rumoured over the last few months, comes with the LinkedIn social network looking for more ways to keep eyes on the site for longer.
The company recently launched a news page of its own, while industry leaders are also writing columns for their followers on the site.
It seems that the Pulse app will form part of this content drive, perhaps with integration into the LinkedIn mobile apps or even within the main site itself.
In a statement confirming the acquisition: LinkedIn senior vice president of product and user experience Deep Nishash wrote: “We believe LinkedIn can be the definitive professional publishing platform – where all professionals come to consume content and where publishers come to share their content. Millions of professionals are already starting their day on LinkedIn to glean the professional insights and knowledge they need to make them great at their jobs. We believe we can help all professionals make smarter and more informed business decisions leveraging all the great business knowledge flowing through LinkedIn in the form of news, Influencer posts, industry updates, discussions, comments and more.”
The company behind Pulse, which started out as a class project at Stamford University, wrote: “We never imagined what the future would hold. We were motivated by our own frustrations with mobile news reading: we wanted an effortless experience, with clean design and easy access to all of our favourite sources.”
Via CNET
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