14 DAY TRIAL // The latest and, hopefully, last rumor about Twitter's TweetDeck acquisition is that it's finally been completed. Twitter has bought TweetDeck for $40 million in cash and stock, somewhat lower than the $50 million that's been rumored in the past. The company still hasn't confirmed anything, but the deal is said to be signed and ready and should be announced soon.
The latest rumor comes from CNN, but outside of the fact that the papers have been filed and the acquisition is completed, there aren't any other details.
Not that there needs to be, Twitter needed to buy TweetDeck even if it doesn't really have anything to do with the apps it offers. The TweetDeck team is a great asset, of course, but perhaps not worth $40 million.
But Twitter had no choice, back in February, rumors surfaced that TweetDeck was being sold to UberMedia, a company that's been gobbling up several other Twitter clients.
The plan was, apparently, to later roll out a Twitter competitor taking advantage of the built-in audience the client apps provided. Twitter couldn't have enabled UberMedia to snatch up TweetDeck, which is the largest third-party client, so it swooped in and blocked the deal at a very late stage with an appealing counter offer.
TweetDeck, it seems, was swayed by the bigger amount of money, UberMedia would have paid $25 million to $30 million, and perhaps the fact that Twitter would be a better fit for the company.
It's hard to say what Twitter plans to do with TweetDeck now that it has acquired it. The company already offers apps for most major platforms, along with the website that should fill the need of desktop and even tablet users, Twitter believes.
TweetDeck is aimed at power users and has several interesting features lacking from the official clients. Twitter, though, has said that it prefers an unified look and feel and has no need or want for an app that doesn't fit into that.