Earlier this week we broke the news that Jambool and their Social Gold virtual currency platform had been acquired by Google. Jambool founders Vikas Gupta and Reza Hussien have just confirmed the deal on their company blog. While the founders did not reveal a purchase price, our sources have it pegged at around $70 millon.
Jambool’s Social Gold monetization platform allows game developers to integrate payment systems into their games. Google’s most recent gaming grab is in line with its current “Google Games” focused acquisition thrust; The search engine recently picked up Slide for $182 million and reportedly just plunked down a $100 million investment in Zynga.
From the Jambool blog:
August 13, 2010
We are excited to announce that Jambool is becoming a part of the Google family today. Jambool started as a social collaboration platform in 2006. In 2007, we shifted our focus to build applications on social networks. Along with success, we found fun and lucrative ways to monetize our apps – specifically virtual currency and goods. That led us to create a platform to help developers create, host, manage and monetize their virtual economies.
Social Gold has grown by leaps and bounds since it went live in 2008. In the first half of 2010, we’ve processed more than double the entire payment volume we processed in all of 2009. And we’ve welcomed hundreds of developers to our platform. The fact that our highest revenue day was in the last week attests to the continued growth of online gaming.
Our vision is to build world-class products that help developers manage and monetize their virtual economies across the globe. When the opportunity arose to join forces with Google to execute against this vision, we couldn’t pass it up. We are thrilled to bring the Social Gold platform to Google’s global users. And we invite you – our customers, partners, and friends – to continue on the journey with us.
Over the last few years, we have had the great fortune of working with an incredible team. Every day, we are amazed and humbled by what they have accomplished. We have had terrific support from our partners, investors and advisors; and we are lucky to have worked with each of them. Thank you!
As a team, we remain passionate about innovating on behalf of our customers. We aim to deliver the most frictionless, seamless transaction experience inside applications and games on every platform. We are thrilled to be part of Google, and we look forward to the exciting road ahead.
The game has only just begun.
Vikas & Reza
Yeah, if by “game,” you mean war.
