Apple Close to Acquiring Radio Streaming Service Swell for $30 MillionApple is close to acquiring talk radio curation service
Swell for about $30 million, reports
Re/code.
Swell's iOS app launched last year and allows users to listen to streaming audio from iTunes, NPR, ABC, ESPN and others through a design that emphasizes simplicity.
As a part of the acquisition, Swell will shut down its iOS app this week as its CEO Ram Ramkumar and other members of its development team will join Apple. Apple will likely look to use Swell's technology to improve its own Podcasts app, which holds a 1.5 star rating and has been widely criticized for performance issues. Users of
Podcasts also experienced an
outage last month, as the app constantly crashed upon opening.
<center> Swell's iOS app </center>
Apple's purchase of Swell follows the
acquisition of "Pandora for Books" startup BookLamp in April for a reported sum between $10 million and $15 million, as the company also
acquired Beats Electronics this past May for $3 billion. It was revealed in the company's
Q3 2014 results earnings call that it had acquired 29 companies since beginning of 2013, with 5 coming from beginning of March quarter, not including Beats.
Update 7/29 12 PM PT: Apple has
confirmed its acquisition of Swell in a statement to
The Wall Street Journal.
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Apple Close to Acquiring Radio Streaming Service Swell for $30 Million
