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eBay buys price-predicting site Decide.com

The e-commerce giant acquires the team and technology behind shopping research Web site Decide.com.

Richard Nieva Former senior reporter
Richard Nieva was a senior reporter for CNET News, focusing on Google and Yahoo. He previously worked for PandoDaily and Fortune Magazine, and his writing has appeared in The New York Times, on CNNMoney.com and on CJR.org.
Richard Nieva
Decide.com announces that it has been acquired by eBay. Screenshot by Carrie Mihalcik/CNET

eBay has snapped up Seattle-based Decide.com, a research service aimed at helping consumers decide when to by products by trying to predict whether prices will go up or down.

The acquisition will allow eBay to tap Decide software developers and data scientists to build a better pricing tools for sellers on eBay. Decide's services, Web site, and mobile apps will be shut down by September 30, according to a note posted by CEO Mike Fridgen on Friday:

Over the past year, we began experimenting with eBay and discovered an exciting opportunity to apply our team's strength in data and predictive analytics to help over 25 million eBay sellers make smarter decisions and be more successful. This is an exciting new chapter and the Decide team will be making the move to eBay's new Seattle-area offices. By September 30, Decide services, website and mobile apps will no longer be available.

All 26 Decide employees, except co-founder Oren Etzioni, will join eBay's team and be based out of its Bellevue, Wash., office. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

In recent years, eBay has turned its sights on beefing up its technology. The company introduced its same-day-delivery service, eBay Now, last summer and has made a handful of acquisitions including mobile scanning company RedLaser and local shopping service Milo.