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The startup world seems to move a mile a minute and we know it can be hard to keep up, so Startup Daily has decided to introduce a weekly news round up of all of the week's big mergers and acquisitions you may have missed.
Every Friday, we will help you get up to speed with all the wheeling and dealing that's gone on around the world in startup land. Since today is our first, we will be looking back across January.
Apple
Apple has bought UK startup Semetric, widely expected to be part of its plans to relaunch the Beats Music streaming platform later this year. Semetric runs an analytics tool called Musicmetric, which was originally launched to help the music industry to track data on sales, illegal downloads, and social networking statistics. It has since expanded to areas such as e-books and television. It’s estimated Apple paid up to $50 million to acquire the startup.
Facebook
Facebook recently acquired Wit.ai, a startup founded by three Frenchmen in California that allows developers to build a voice interface for their app.
Garmin
Navigation equipment company Garmin has acquired South African startup iKubu, developer of radar systems for the cycling market. The company was developing a bike radar called the Backtracker, which gives cyclists the speed and distance of approaching vehicles.
Twitter
Twitter acquired Zipdial this week. The Indian startup has made a business of missed calls, which are used by Indians with pricey phone plans as a means of communication with friends and family. Zipdial has leveraged this phenomenon to create opportunities for brands to engage with consumers.
Daumkakao
South Korean internet services company Daumkakao has acquired Kid Note, a service allowing kindergarten teachers and day care staff to send a child's schedule, diet, pictures, and other information to parents throughout the day. 14 000 daycare centres and educational institutions have signed up to the service.
Shutterstock
Stock photo, video, and music platform Shutterstock announced that it has acquired Rex Features, the largest independently owned photographic press agency in Europe. Shutterstock CEO Jon Oringer said the acquisition marks the company's "substantive entry into editorial imagery" which will give it "many opportunities to better serve global media companies."
Dropbox
Dropbox has bought Israeli mobile productivity startup CloudOn. The service will be shutting down and merging with Dropbox in March.
Zomato
India's Zomato, a restaurant discovery service, has bought Urbanspoon. As well as India, the company already has a presence in big markets like the UK and Brazil. The acquisition of Urbanspoon will see Zomato move into the US and Australia. The company acquired New Zealand's MenuMania last year.
Intuit
Accounting software company Intuit has acquired ZeroPaper, a Brazilian startup helping small businesses with cloud accounting services. Intuit stated it hopes to work with the ZeroPaper team to address the growing small business market in Brazil.
Xiaomi
Smartphone company Xiaomi announced it has bought 2.98 per cent of Hong Kong gaming and software company Kingsoft for approximately USD$68 million, signalling its intention to increase its focus on software and services.
Image via Wired.
