Apple Taps Into Twitter, Buying Social Analytics Firm Topsy

By DAISUKE WAKABAYASHI And
DOUGLAS MACMILLAN
Dec. 2, 2013 4:47 p.m. ET


A Twitter Inc. tweet regarding the company ringing the opening bell on the New York Stock Exchange is displayed on an Apple iPhone. Bloomberg News

Apple Inc. AAPL -0.87% has acquired social-media analytics firm Topsy Labs Inc. for more than $200 million, according to people familiar with the matter.

Topsy specializes in data from Twitter,TWTR -1.90% offering tools to analyze tweets and other information to help track consumer sentiment. Its tools can decipher how often a specific term is tweeted, find an influential person on a specific subject, or measure the exposure of an event or campaign.

The company is one of a handful of Twitter's partners who have access to the so-called "firehose"—the full stream of all tweets posted to the service. Topsy competes with DataSift Inc. and Gnip Inc. to analyze and resell this data to customers.
An Apple spokeswoman confirmed the deal but wouldn't comment further. "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans," she said without elaborating further.

Topsy didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

It's unclear how Apple plans to use Topsy. There may be opportunities to link Topsy's technology with Apple's iTunes Radio, an online-streaming-music competitor to Pandora Media Inc. and Spotify AB. One possible scenario would use data from Topsy to alert listeners to songs that are trending or artists being discussed on Twitter.

Topsy also could provide marketers with real-time data to sell targeted advertising on iTunes radio.

Apple has been wrestling with a tepid response from marketers for its iAd platform, which was launched in 2010 to sell ads within mobile apps on iPhones, iPads and iPods running on the company's iOS software.

Apple initially required advertisers to spend $1 million in an iAd campaign. It has since lowered that threshold to $100,000 per campaign in an effort to broaden its appeal to advertisers.

Apple started iAd to make building iOS apps more attractive for developers, who are increasingly interested in building software for Android devices.

The acquisition marks Apple's latest foray into social networking, after past missteps. Its Ping music-sharing service was shuttered last year after it failed to excite users.

Apple last year made it easier for users of its devices to share photos and messages on social networks including Twitter and Facebook without opening those apps.

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