This year summer has marked its beginning with a number of major acquisitions by internet giants like Google and Facebook. Adding to it, Twitter has just announced its acquisition of Atebits. Atbetis develops popular iPhone and Mac applications.
Twitter CEO Evan Williams announced the acquisition of Atebits on the official Twitter Blog. Tweetie will be renamed as “Twitter for iPhone” and will be made free within few weeks. Currently, it costs $2.99. He also announced that Loren Brichter, creator of Tweeetie, would also join the mobile team at Twitter.
Here is the official announcement by Williams on Twitter Blog:
We’re thrilled to announce that we’ve entered into an agreement with Atebits (aka Loren Brichter) to acquire Tweetie, a leading iPhone Twitter client. Tweetie will be renamed Twitter for iPhone and made free (currently $2.99) in the iTunes AppStore in the coming weeks. Loren will become a key member of our mobile team that is already having huge impact with device makers and service providers around the world. Loren’s work won the 2009 Apple Design Award and we will eventually launch Twitter for iPad with his help.
Williams also mentioned about the launch of an official Twitter for iPad app with the help of Loren.
Notably, it will be interesting to see how this acquisition affects the unofficial Twitter apps developers such as TweetDeck, Seesmic, or HootSuite.
{ 2 comments }
It will affect all 3rd party ecology around Twitter. I feel they are re-designing Twitter.com too and that will include URL shortners along with stats tracking and various options.
This might hurt the 3rd party services quite a bit. It will totally destroy the app industry if Twitter.com allows people to schedule their Tweets.
Nah I dont think so it will 'destroy' the 3rd party app industry.. As far as this acquisition is concerned, this is just for the iPhone and i don't think twitter has any plans for acquiring the whole 'Mobile Twitter World'.
And the re-design won't provide all the features which most popular twitter clients like tweetdeck, seesmic, provides. Although their market share will be affected but the margin would be very low. What do you say