Viber Buyout

Viber, the Israeli-founded video and voice communications app, has been acquired by Japanese Internet services company Rakuten for $900 million. Rakuten, an electronic commerce and Internet company, is the largest e-commerce site in Japan, and one of the largest in the world.

With Viber, Rakuten CEO Hiroshi Mikitani said, his company hopes to expand its e-commerce reach with enhanced communications capabilities. “In the future, e-commerce will become a more communication-based transaction,” Mikitani said. “Live interactivity is going to be critical for all Internet services.”

In a statement, Marco said that Viber would now have access to a large and growing market. “There was a sense that we can accelerate the growth of our company by tapping into Rakuten’s user base in various countries,” Marco said. “We would be able to continue to build Viber, continue to maintain the mentality and speed of a startup while having support.”

The app, that allows users to make free phone and video calls within its network, has over 200 million users all over the world, including many in Arab countries – exceptional for an app that was created in Israel. Although the company is currently based in Cyprus, its R&D center remains in Israel. Viber was released about three years ago and positioned by company CEO Talmon Marco as an alternative to Skype.

Congratulations Rakuten ;-)