Apple acquired 'Pandora for books' startup BookLamp earlier this year
July 26, 2014
Apple has acquired BookLamp, an Idaho-based startup that has developed what has been described as a sort of "Pandora for books."
The acquisition has come to light thanks to a new report by TechCrunch, which "has learned that Apple has made another acquisition, one that it is using to boost its e-books effort and 'beat Amazon at its own game.'"
BookLamp is best known for its Book Genome Project, a book discovery and recommendation engine based on the data-extensive analysis of other titles. Most probably, Apple's acquisition of BookLamp is aimed at integrating the technology behind Book Genome Project into Apple's iBooks, particularly with regard to improving the e-book service's discovery and recommendation capabilities.
Apple's purchase of BookLamp apparently took place as late as last April, when BookLamp announced that it would be shutting down the Book Genome Project as it "evolves its mission." Apple reportedly bought BookLamp for a price ranging from $10 million and $15 million.
Apple has confirmed that it has purchased BookLamp using its standard statement: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."
BookLamp turns out to be one of the 29 companies that Apple revealed, during its earnings report earlier this week, to have acquired in the last nine months, i.e., since the beginning of fiscal 2014.
