Facebook acquires first Israeli company

March 21, 2011 - 10:01 AM by David

Facebook has acquired its first Israeli startup, paying $60-70 million for Snaptu, which has developed Internet applications for mobile phones.

Founded by Israelis Lior Tal, Ran Makavy, Micha Berdichevsky, and Barak Naveh, Snaptu allows mobile phones – even those less advanced than an iPhone or Android phone – to access mobile Internet.

According to a press release issued about the acquisition, Snaptu will provide a base for Facebook’s R&D center in Israel. “Earlier this year, we announced the launch of a new Facebook mobile application to give people a great mobile experience on a broad range of feature phones,” Snaptu announced. “We soon decided that working as part of the Facebook team offered the best opportunity to keep accelerating the pace of our product development. And joining Facebook means we can make an even bigger impact on the world.”
As I was checking my FB statuses after reading the news reports about the deal, I started thinking about the differences between my Israeli and American Facebook friends’ usage of the ubiquitous social network site.

While everyone, regardless of their geography, uses their status updated for shameless self-promotion, the Americans more often treat their Facebook page as mostly a ‘social’ site, commenting on films, events, family and pop culture.

The Israelis (and most of the American Jewish friends) tend to use as an information vehicle about Israel – linking to news items, slamming the Palestinians (or Israelis as the case may be) or changing their profile photo to Gilad Schalit.

Snaptu’s application will apparently help everyone do their own thing a little more easily, and will undoubtedly not be the last time we hear about a Facebook-Israel connection.

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