14 DAY TRIAL // Owned until recently by Linkoping, Sweden-based company Xcerion, the domain name iCloud.com is now an asset of Apple Inc., according to a person who claims to be familiar with the matter.
A GicaOM report explains that, until recently, 'iCloud.com' was a domain name and a storage-as-a-cloud service attributed to the people at Xcerion.
They’ve just rebranded that name to CloudMe, and the company acquired the CloudMe.com domain on April 5, 2011, according to the report.
Citing a person who says is familiar with the company, the site reports that Xcerion has sold the domain to Apple.
Not only that, but the deal reportedly went down for about $4.5 million. Providing actual figures always lends credence to such rumors, though we are still taking this one with the usual grain of salt.
Xcerion refused to comment when queried on the matter. If the deal is true, Apple will have asked the company to keep the acquisition under tight wraps until the people in Cupertino confirm a new cloud-based service on their own terms.
Speaking of which, avid Softpedia readers are undoubtedly familiar with the rumors circling around a revamp of the MobileMe service.
This summer, Apple may not only unveil just Mac OS X 10.7 Lion and iOS 5, but also an all-new iCloud, if you will, which reportedly acts as a multi-media locker for all those holding an Apple ID.
Apple’s presumed plans are to offer every customer a ‘box’ in which they can store their whole digital life, much like the popular Dropbox service.
And exactly like Dropbox, Apple may offer free and paid subscriptions depending on everyone’s storage needs.
The likelihood of Apple replacing the MobileMe iDisk with iCloud is fairly obvious, but we are still waiting for someone in Cupertino to confirm all this before we get all excited about it.