Professional networking website LinkedIn Corp. (NASDAQ:LNKD) said it has agreed to acquire e-reader company Pulse for about $90 million, as the company works to grow its content and mobile initiatives.
Shares of LinkedIn moved between slight gains and losses Friday, lately down 16 cents at $180.02.
The deal will be comprised of 90-per-cent stock and 10-per-cent cash, and LinkedIn said the stock being issued in the transaction will be done so in a private placement. It is expected to close during the second quarter of 2013.
Pulse, owned by Alphonso Labs, Inc., was founded in 2010 by Akshay Kothari and Ankit Gupta while they were students at Stanford University. The company has since grown to become “one of the most widely used platforms for content consumption on the internet”.
"We are thrilled to be able to add Pulse's considerable talent, technology, and products to our growing ecosystem of content offerings, and we believe that they will help us accelerate our ability to deliver to our members the insights they need to be better at what they do, on any device," said LinkedIn’s SVP of products and user experience Deep Nishar.
Pulse has more than 30 million users on it iOS and Android-based news reader apps in more than 190 countries. Pulse is available in nine languages, and approximately 40 per cent of users are outside the United States. More than 750 of the world's leading publishers distribute their content through Pulse.
After the closing of the deal, LinkedIn said Pulse’s existing apps will continue to be supported.