GIPHY was founded in 2013 by Alex Chung and Jace Cooke for users to search GIFs online. The company attracted 1 million people in the very first week and soon GIPHY allowed users to post and share the GIFs on Facebook.
Facebook on Friday announced that it has acquired GIPHY for closer integration with all its applications. More than half of GIPHY’s traffic was from Facebook-owned applications such as Instagram, Whatsapp, Messenger, and Facebook app. Instagram alone accounts for 50% of the traffic among the mentioned apps.
Facebook says, “By bringing Instagram and GIPHY together, we can make it easier for people to find the perfect GIFs and stickers in Stories and Direct. Both our services are big supporters of the creator and artist community, and that will continue. Together, we can make it easier for anyone to create and share their work with the world…GIFs and stickers give people meaningful and creative ways to express themselves. We see the positivity in how people use GIPHY in our products today, and we know that bringing the GIPHY team’s creativity and talent together with ours will only accelerate how people use visual communication to connect with each other.”
It is rumored that Facebook paid around $400 million for the acquisition of GIPHY. Previously, Facebook also acquired some of the other well-known applications like WhatsApp for around $21 Billion and Instagram for around $1 billion which have turned out to be very profitable for the company.
