Apple Considered Purchasing a Large Stake in Twitter
Apple is either actively considering purchasing a major stake in Twitter or discussed making an investment with the social company more than a year ago and the talks have since ceased, depending on which newspaper one wishes to believe.
The New York Times reported tonight that Apple and Twitter were talking "in recent months" about a major strategic investment in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Apple has considered an investment in the hundreds of millions of dollars, one that could value Twitter at more than $10 billion, up from an $8.4 billion valuation last year, these people said. They declined to be named because the discussions were private.
There is no guarantee that the two companies, which are not in negotiations at the moment, will come to an agreement. But the earlier talks are a sign that they may form a stronger partnership amid intensifying competition from the likes of Google and Facebook.
However, within several hours of the posting of the Times piece, The Wall Street Journal posted a rebuttal of sorts, saying that the Apple/Twitter discussions took place more than a year ago and didn't go anywhere:
Apple Inc. held discussions with Twitter Inc. more than a year ago about taking a strategic investment in the short-messaging service, according to a person familiar with the talks.
People familiar with the matter said there are no current formal investment or acquisition discussions between the companies.
News of the investment talks was first reported by the New York Times.
Apple has run into difficulties in its social media efforts with the Ping social network on the chopping block according to Apple CEO Tim Cook. Walter Isaacson, Steve Jobs' biographer, said recently that social was one nut that Steve Jobs couldn't crack.
In the past year, rather than building its own social product, Apple has partnered with both Twitter and Facebook to integrate their API's into the new versions of both the iOS and OS X platforms.
Popular Stories
Apple's AirPods have been credited with saving a woman's life after a potentially fatal fall, People reports.
When a 60-year-old florist in New Jersey tripped and hit her head in her studio, she lost consciousness and awoke heavily bleeding. With nobody around to call for help, she realized she had her AirPods in, and used a "Hey Siri" command to call 911. An operator was able to stay on the ...
It's now been a few months since the M1 Pro and M1 Max MacBook Pro models launched in October, and MacRumors video editor Dan Barbera has been using one of the new machines since they debuted. Over on the MacRumors YouTube channel, Dan has shared a three month review of his MacBook Pro to see how it has held up over time and how it's changed his workflow.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube ...
Apple suppliers will begin producing display panels for the third-generation iPhone SE this month, with final assembly of the device likely to start in March, according to information shared by display industry consultant Ross Young.
Based on this production timeframe, Young believes the third-generation iPhone SE is likely to launch in the second half of April, or perhaps in early May at...
Apple will no longer include EarPods with every iPhone sold in France, starting on January 24, according to a notice posted by a French carrier (via iGeneration). Apple was previously required to include EarPods in the box with the iPhone due to a French law that required every smartphone sold in the country to come with a "handsfree kit," but the law has now been changed in favor of reducing the ...
Earlier this week, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman tweeted that Apple "will be holding a spring event" to announce a new iPhone SE and other hardware. In a recent edition of his newsletter, Gurman said the event is likely to occur in March or April.
Gurman did not elaborate on what "other hardware" will be announced at Apple's purported spring event, but rumors suggest at least four products are...
Following months of bleak news about Peloton's "precarious state," including the revelation that it has halted production of its bikes and treadmills, Apple is being floated as a potential buyer of Peloton's troubled fitness business.
Yesterday, CNBC reported that Peloton will temporarily stop production of its connected fitness products due to a "significant reduction" in consumer demand, a ...
The watchOS 8.4 release candidate that was seeded to developers and beta testers this morning addresses an ongoing bug that could cause some Apple Watch chargers not to work properly with the Apple Watch.
Back in December, we reported on a growing number of charging issues that Apple Watch Series 7 owners were facing. Since watchOS 8.3, there have been a number of complaints about...
Thursday January 20, 2022 3:32 am PST by
Sami FathiApple patched two significant security vulnerabilities when it released iOS 15 that could have potentially exposed users' private Apple ID information and in-app search history to malicious third-party apps and allowed apps to override user Privacy preferences, Apple has revealed in a recent support document update.
With most iOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS updates, Apple provides a list of...
The macOS Monterey 12.2 and iOS 15.3 release candidates that came out today appear to address a Safari bug that could cause your recent browsing history and details about your identity to be leaked to malicious entities.
As shared last week by browser fingerprinting service FingerprintJS, there is an issue with the WebKit implementation of the IndexedDB JavaScript API. Any website that uses...
Top Rated Comments
Ugh, what is Courier New doing here?
----------
I see a LOT more use for Apple and Facebook to get closer, rather than Apple and Twitter... I can't for the life of me even force myself to use Twitter.
That is because social networking is a feature and not a standalone business in my opinion. Same goes for Dropbox. Eventually you hit a wall where you really can't make that much more money.