Published 14:44 IST, April 22nd 2020
Here's where Zuckerberg's Jio Platform deal stands in list of Facebook's large investments
Besides its investment in Jio Platforms, Facebook has a long list of mergers and acquisitions in its kitty such as WhatsApp, Instagram, Oculus VR to name a few.
Global social media giant Facebook on Wednesday announced an investment of USD 5.7 billion (Rs 43,574 crore) for acquiring a 9.99 per cent minority stake in Jio Platforms, making it the largest ever for a minority stake by a technology company anywhere in the world and the largest FDI in the technology sector in India, as per the Reliance statement. Facebook’s investment will transform Jio Platforms into one of the top five listed companies in India by market capitalisation at about USD 65 billion.
Besides its investment in Jio Platforms, Facebook has a long list of mergers and acquisitions in its kitty.
Some of the major acquisitions are:
One of its first major acquisitions was in April 2012, when Facebook acquired Instagram for approximately US$1 billion in cash and stock. Just days ahead of its acquisition by Facebook, Instagram had released a version of its app for Android phones and it was downloaded more than one million times in less than one day.
In October 2013, Facebook acquired Onavo, an Israeli mobile web analytics company for USD 120 million.
In 2014, Facebook acquired WhatsApp for USD19 billion. The WhatsApp acquisition is termed as Facebook's largest acquisition to date with an amount of USD 4 billion in cash, USD 12 billion shares and an additional USD 3 billion in restricted stock units paid to WhatsApp granted to WhatsApp's founders Brian Acton and Jan Koum. Currently, the messaging platform is used by 1.5 billion active users in 180 countries across the world.
Later in 2014, Facebook bought Oculus VR for USD 2.3 billion in stock and cash, which released its first consumer virtual reality headset in 2016. In late November 2019, Facebook announced the acquisition of game developer Beat Games, responsible for developing one of the year's most popular VR titles, Beat Saber.
Facebook investment deal of USD 5.5 billion in Jio Platforms could well be said to be the second-largest deal for the social media giant after WhatsApp.
Updated 14:45 IST, April 22nd 2020