14 DAY TRIAL // Before unveiling iCloud this summer, Apple reportedly pitched an $800 million deal to file-storage company Dropbox for the acquisition of their assets, an offer that got turned down amid a higher valuation incentive.
According to a couple of second-hand ‘gossipers’ close to Business Insider, Enterprise software-as-a-service company Citrix and Apple this summer learned that Dropbox would see their revenues reach $100 million this year.
Before Dropbox had raised a huge round of running at a $4 billion valuation, the company had been lobbied by Apple with an offer of $800 million to engulf their services, the report says.
A service that has seen worldwide adoption in just a few years since its launch, Dropbox has experienced immense growth, making it difficult for its co-founders to accept Apple’s offer.
And it appears they were right to do so. A new round of investment by Index Ventures put Dropbox at $4 billion valuation. In other words, Dropbox co-founder Drew Houston is a paper billionaire.
It is unclear what exactly Apple was after, but surely they had their reasons to bid for Dropbox.
The Mac maker headquartered at 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, California later unveiled iCloud, a suite of web-based services that revolves around the same concept as Dropbox, only it features optimized tools for storing music, video, photos, as well as to push email and the sorts.
iCloud will be seamlessly integrated into Mac OS X and iOS apps so users can access their content on all of their devices.
When users sign up for iCloud this fall, they will get a free 5GB account with options to go for more storage in exchange for a yearly fee.
Dropbox users get a free 2GB account when they sign up, and they can opt for a paid plan that gives them 50GB and 100GB of storage.