Google gets Wavii in $30M deal, report says
News personalization startup Wavii -- apparently sought after by Apple for Apple's Siri division -- gets gobbled up by Google, according to TechCrunch.
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Google has acquired the personalized-news startup Wavii for more than $30 million, according to a report.
TechCrunch cites "a legitimate source" as saying that Google beat out Apple for the Seattle-based startup, which developed its own automated, personalized news "feed" app. Apple reportedly wanted the company for its Siri division.
Yahoo made a similar deal in March, when it spent $30 million to acquire the news-reading app Summly from teenager Nick D'Aloisio.
When Wavii debuted in April 2010, CNET's Rafe Needleman described it this way: "Wavii is a smart timeline of the news. Its core value is that it runs its semantic engine against several hundred news feeds and is able to determine and display what stories are about."
Wavii's 25-person team, including founder Adrian Aoun, will be moved to join Google's Knowledge Graph division, according to TechCrunch.
Wavii was founded in 2009 and raised more than $2 million in seed funding at the time of acquisition from funders including Felicis Investments, SV Angel, CrunchFund, Mitch Kapor, Max Levchin, and others, according to CrunchBase.
Google declined to comment. We have an e-mail in to Wavii and will update this story if we hear back.