Chomp, chomp: Apple eats Aussie start-up for $US50m

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Chomp, chomp: Apple eats Aussie start-up for $US50m

By Ben Grubb and Asher Moses
Updated

Apple has acquired Australian-born internet entrepreneurs Ben Keighran and Cathy Edwards's mobile app search engine Chomp for about $US50 million, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Apple confirmed to Fairfax Media that it had acquired Chomp but did not go into detail. "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans," it said in an emailed statement.

Ben Keighran at the Chomp headquarters in Silicon Valley.

Ben Keighran at the Chomp headquarters in Silicon Valley.

Keighran is the CEO and co-founder of Chomp, the leading app search engine. Edwards is also a co-founder and the company's chief technology officer.

Chomp is backed by some of the biggest venture capital firms in Silicon Valley and counts Ashton Kutcher and Digg founder Kevin Rose as advisors. Tech Crunch first reported news of the acquisition.

Ben Keighran, CEO of Chomp.

Ben Keighran, CEO of Chomp.

The tech blog said Chomp had raised a little over $US2.5 million over two rounds of funding and had 20 employees, all of whom "should be heading over to Apple".

A person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named because the specifics were private, told Bloomberg News that the deal was worth $US50m.

Comment is being sought from Ben Keighran about the deal. Brad Kellett, engineering lead at Chomp and also an Australian, offered "no comment" via Twitter. Kevin Rose tweeted "woo hoo, Apple buys Chomp, stoked to have been involved! :)". It was deleted shortly after.

Ben Keighran moved from Sydney to San Francisco in 2007 where he raised $US6.5 million for his mobile social networking company, Bluepulse.

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Cathy Edwards.

Cathy Edwards.

Keighran, who taught himself to code C++ by the time he was 13 and launched a popular bulletin board system that overwhelmed his parents' phone line, was named one of America's Top Entrepreneurs under 25 by BusinessWeek in 2007.

Chomp's software lets people search through the hundreds of thousands of downloadable applications available for Apple's iPad and iPhone, as well as gadgets running Google's Android operating system.

Users can enter queries such as "tip calculator" or "kids games" to get different options of apps that fit those descriptions. Apple's App Store has been criticised by some developers as difficult to navigate beyond the few programs in featured areas on the site.

Apple's mobile devices lead the industry in applications, with more than 550,000 available in the company's App Store. Apple is closing in on 25 billion total downloads from the store, chief executive officer Tim Cook said today.

With past acquisitions of small companies, such as the LaLa music store, Apple has shut down the service and integrated the technology or engineers into its own operations.

Venture backers

Chomp's investors include BlueRun Ventures, SV Angel founder Ron Conway, Aydin Senkut, David Lee, Brian Pokorny and Auren Hoffman. The company also is a partner with Verizon Wireless, which uses Chomp's search technology in its app store.

Apple, boosted by the success of the iPhone and iPad, has accumulated $US97.6 billion in cash and investments on its balance sheet. While the company hasn't made multibillion-dollar deals, Apple's executives said earlier this year that acquisitions are among the options it's considering for the money.

With Bloomberg

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