In what I can only describe as surprising news, news aggregation service socialmedian is being acquired by linkedin competitor XING.
According to a post published this morning by SocialMedian founder Jason Goldberg, the entire socialmedian team will be joining XING. I assume this includes both their US and India based development team. Goldberg will be relocating to Hamburg as part of the agreement and will lead a “major new initiative” on behalf of his new company. Goldberg will also be given the newly created position of “VP XING Applications Platform” – responsible managing global partnerships on behalf of the XING network.
According to a blog post by current XING CEO Lars Hinrichs, SocialMedian makes a the ideal acquisition for the business social network because:
“In business success depends on access to the right information at the right time. Both the speed of information and the sheer volume of data have increased rapidly due to the rise of the internet. Traditional media companies, social media such as blogs, tweets, videos and other user-generated websites now provide daily news, leading to a veritable flood of information. The consequence: Time-strapped professionals are forced to parse through numerous news sources for relevant information and sort, organize, and share stories on their own.”
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As yet, no word on the financials have been disclosed. TechCrunch reports $7.5 Million.
With currently over 6.5 million members, this marks another interesting landmark in publicly listed XING’s growth. We reported only a few weeks ago on the news of a change in CEO at XING and now with the news of this acquisition it marks another change in direction.
**Update**
We have an interview with Jason Goldberg regarding the acquisition.
More Info at:
Social Median Blog, XING blog, Official Press Release, TC, RWW
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