{"id":60960,"date":"2014-02-20T00:21:44","date_gmt":"2014-02-19T22:21:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/onsoftware.en.softonic.com\/?p=60960"},"modified":"2025-07-02T00:52:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T07:52:12","slug":"facebook-buys-whatsapp-for-16-billion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/facebook-buys-whatsapp-for-16-billion\/","title":{"rendered":"Facebook to acquire WhatsApp for $16 billion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Facebook has purchased the popular multiplatform messaging app, WhatsApp, for $16 billion in cash ($4 billion) and stock ($12 billion). A United States <a title=\"SEC Facebook &amp; WhatsApp filing\" href=\"http:\/\/www.sec.gov\/Archives\/edgar\/data\/1326801\/000132680114000010\/form8k_2192014.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Securities and Exchange Commission filing<\/a> released today shows the merger agreement.<\/p>\n<p>According to a Facebook blog post, WhatsApp will remain as an independent product and will retain it&#8217;s own brand. WhatsApp CEO, Jan Koum, has this to say to his users: &#8220;Here\u2019s what will change for you, our users: nothing. WhatsApp will remain autonomous and operate independently. You can continue to enjoy the service for a nominal fee.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>This move is similar to what Facebook did with its acquisition of Instagram. WhatsApp will undoubtedly be integrated to Facebook&#8217;s services, though it remains to be seen how. Will Messenger be discontinued in favor of WhatsApp or can the two live side-by-side?<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em><strong>&#8220;WhatsApp is on a path to connect 1 billion people. The services that reach that milestone are all incredibly valuable.&#8221;<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Facebook and WhatsApp have similar visions for &#8220;bringing connectivity and utility to the world,&#8221; hence the reason for the acquisition. &#8220;WhatsApp is on a path to connect 1 billion people. The services that reach that milestone are all incredibly valuable,&#8221; said Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder and CEO. &#8220;I&#8217;ve known Jan for a long time and I&#8217;m excited to partner with him and his team to make the world more open and connected.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>With over 450 million active monthly users and over 20 billion messages sent per day, WhatsApp was beating Facebook&#8217;s Messenger app by a huge margin. Although Facebook Messenger offered more features like animated stickers and free internet calling, the simplicity and universality of WhatsApp drew in more users.<\/p>\n<p>Source: <a title=\"Facebook to Acquire WhatsApp\" href=\"http:\/\/newsroom.fb.com\/News\/805\/Facebook-to-Acquire-WhatsApp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Facebook<\/a> | <a title=\"WhatsApp\" href=\"http:\/\/blog.whatsapp.com\/index.php\/2014\/02\/facebook\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">WhatsApp<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Facebook has purchased the popular multiplatform messaging app, WhatsApp, for $16 billion in cash ($4 billion) and stock ($12 billion). A United States Securities and Exchange Commission filing released today shows the merger agreement. According to a Facebook blog post, WhatsApp will remain as an independent product and will retain it&#8217;s own brand. WhatsApp CEO, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/facebook-buys-whatsapp-for-16-billion\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Facebook to acquire WhatsApp for $16 billion&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2033,"featured_media":60964,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wpcf-pageviews":0},"categories":[],"tags":[2333],"usertag":[],"vertical":[],"content-category":[],"class_list":["post-60960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-app-subdomain-redirectionwhatsapp"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2033"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60960"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60960\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":331306,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60960\/revisions\/331306"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60960"},{"taxonomy":"usertag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/usertag?post=60960"},{"taxonomy":"vertical","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vertical?post=60960"},{"taxonomy":"content-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/content-category?post=60960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}