Facebook Acquires Popular App WhatsApp for US$16 Billion

Facebook is acquiring the popular messaging app WhatsApp for 16 billion USD, 4 billion in cash and the rest in Facebook's shares. The founder of the app Jan Koum will join the Facebook board of directors.

In April 2013 there was a rumour of Google buying this company, but somehow WhatsApp declined that offer.

"WhatsApp will complement our existing chat and messaging services to provide new tools for our community. Facebook Messenger is widely used for chatting with your Facebook friends, and WhatsApp for communicating with all of your contacts and small groups of people. Since WhatsApp and Messenger serve such different and important uses, we will continue investing in both and making them each great products for everyone." - Mark Zuckerberg

WhatsApp is a cross-platform mobile messaging app that allows text, goto, video, audio sending between individuals or within a group. It collects an annual fee of US$1 from new users but did not add ads.

Jan Koum said that he would decline the offer should Facebook disrupt the core values of WhatsApp, including implementing ads.