More rumors are swirling today about a Tweetdeck acquisition. This time, it’s Twitter buying the popular client for $40 to $50 million. According to TechCrunch, the rumors are being confirmed by “a source with knowledge of the deal,” but has not been confirmed by Twitter or Tweetdeck at this time.
Twitter has acquired TweetDeck, we’ve heard from a source with knowledge of the deal, and the transaction will be announced in the next few days. The $40 million – $50 million purchase price includes both cash and Twitter stock, says our source.
It seems that Twitter may have been forced into buying TweetDeck because of UberMedia, who was also looking to acquire it. Ubermedia’s Ubersocial Twitter client is the 3rd most popular while Tweetdeck is the 4th. There was talk last month that Ubermedia was planning to create a Twitter competitor. This isn’t that far-fetched given their popularity in the Twitter ecosystem, and acquiring TweetDeck would have created serious problems for Twitter.
This scenario is confirmed by sources close to the matter. Twitter absolutely could not let Ubermedia gain any more leverage over them. The power is in the user base and Ubermedia would have had too much control over a large number of Twitter users. Check out TechCrunch EU for a rundown of possible scenarios.
via TechCrunch