Friday 19 July 2013

Facebook lands bug hunters with Monoidics buy

Computerworld - Facebook is acquiring the assets of Monoidics, a U.K.-based software startup, including its bug-hunting technical team.

The two companies announced the acquisition, which should boost Facebook's mobile efforts, in separate blog posts on Thursday.

The technical team at Monoidics, a four-year-old company that builds code verification and analysis software, will join Facebook's London offices once the deal closes, according to Monoidics' blog. Since this isn't a full company acquisition, the technical team will be the only Monoidics employees to join Facebook.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"This asset acquisition represents our investment in the quality of our mobile applications platform and also our people, as members of their talented engineering team will join us to work at Facebook's London office once the deal closes (pending certain closing conditions)," wrote Philip Su, a Facebook software engineer, in a blog post on the site. "Their entrepreneurial spirit and desire to make an impact make them great additions to Facebook."

Monoidics builds programs that check other software, specifically mobile software, for bugs.

That's a key acquisition for Facebook, which has been sharply focused on becoming a mobile-centric company for the past year.

"Facebook knows that mobile is key to their growth," said Dan Olds, an analyst with The Gabriel Consulting Group. "It's been pounded into their heads by every Wall Street analyst and industry pundit. And Facebook has done a pretty good job of playing catch-up in mobile, increasing their mobile-related revenue sharply. They need to continue growing and coming up with innovative ways to quickly take advantage of opportunities in this space. The acquisition of Monoidics should help them accomplish that."

He added that the move is an obvious effort to improve the quality of the social network's mobile code before it goes out the door and lands in users' hands.

"This should help them develop mobile apps faster and churn out higher quality versions at a lower cost," said Olds. "While the software assets Monoidics brings to the table are important, I would think the personnel Facebook is bringing onboard will be ultimately even more valuable."

This article, Facebook lands bug hunters with Monoidics buy, was originally published at Computerworld.com.

Sharon Gaudin covers the Internet and Web 2.0, emerging technologies, and desktop and laptop chips for Computerworld. Follow Sharon on Twitter at Twitter @sgaudin, on Google+ or subscribe to Sharon's RSS feed Gaudin RSS. Her email address is sgaudin@computerworld.com.

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