Leaked Emails From Sony Pictures Hack Uncovered Several Acquisitions Made By Snapchat

December 20, 2014

from the Sony Pictures hack have uncovered several acquisitions made by Snapchat, as well as plans for a music feature and meetings to discuss partnerships with Twitter.

According to emails between Snapchat, Sony Entertainment CEO Michael Lynton, and Snapchat board member Mitch Lasky, Snapchat bought a QR scanning and iBeacon startup called Scan.me for $14 million in cash, $3 million in restricted stock units and $33 million in Class B common Snapchat stock. It also acquired Vergence Labs, makers of an eyeglass video camera, for $11 million in cash and $4 million in stock.

Snapchat also apparently paid $10 million in cash and $20 million in stock and bonuses for AddLive, the startup Snapchat bought to power its real-time video chat feature but didn’t have the price for.

Other information contained in the emails includes that fact that Snapchat has recently been working on a music feature, and CEO Evan Spiegel has grand aspirations to promote artists through his app and capitalize on their success. Snapchat negotiated with Vevo for a feature that sounds like it would bring music video viewing inside Snapchat in August, but hit a snag over the revenue sharing on advertising. Valleywag reported earlier today that emails indicate the acquisition deal from Facebook that Snapchat turned down was more than $3 billion.

(Tech 2)