Twitter Acquires Social Analytics Firm Bluefin Labs

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Twitter has announced that it will purchase social media analytics vendor Bluefin Labs. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Bloomberg’s Douglas MacMillan reported, “Twitter Inc., the microblogging service that features 140-character status updates, is paying about $100 million to acquire startup Bluefin Labs, according to a person familiar with the matter. San Francisco-based Twitter announced the deal today in a blog posting. The person asked not to be identified because the price isn’t being disclosed. Bluefin Labs, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, makes software that lets advertisers, agencies and networks monitor and analyze social-media comments about TV shows and commercials.”

Business Insider’s Owen Thomas noted, “Twitter COO Ali Rowghani said in a blog post that it would honor Bluefin’s existing contracts, but focus development on an existing partnership with Nielsen, the dominant TV-ratings player. Twitter is keeping Bluefin and Crashlytics, another Boston-area startup it recently bought, in One Kendall Square—a local startup hub that both happened to occupy.”

According to All Things D’s Peter Kafka, “My understanding is that the deal isn’t done yet, but it will be soon. When it is, Twitter will likely end up spending more than $70 million for the company. Bluefin raised a reported $20.5 million over its four-year life, so at least some of its investors, which include Softbank and Time Warner, will see a respectable return. This isn’t an ‘acqhire’: Twitter is buying both Bluefin’s team and its technology, and will end up turning its Boston headquarters into a Twitter outpost.”

Brian Stelter with The New York Times observed, “The deal suggests a new line of business for Twitter, which is under pressure to increase its revenue. Bluefin calls itself a social TV analytics company, one of many that have cropped up as Facebook and Twitter have created an instantaneous stream of commentary that helps inform television producers and distributors. Companies like CBS, which televised the Super Bowl on Sunday, pay Bluefin for information about what is being said about them online.”