Google seems to be acquiring a new startup every couple of months, but it’s a small price to pay for keeping their top position in the tech industry. Their latest purchase is Fly Labs, whose media editing technology Google will integrate into its Photos app.
The move was announced on Fly Labs’ website, where CEO Tim Novikoff clarified the team will be “pouring the same passion into Google Photos that we poured into [its apps] Clips, Fly, Tempo, and Crop on the Fly.”
In celebration of the acquisition, Fly Labs disclosed that all of its apps will now be “completely free with no in-app purchases” and will be up for download in the App Store only for the next 3 months. After that, however, updates for the apps will only be available for download on Google Play.
Google adds Fly Labs’ technology to its portfolio, a move that will give its Photos app more media-editing capabilities in order to compete with the ever-updating Instagram and other photo- and video-sharing platforms. And something has to be done if Google wants to keep its 100 million monthly active users using the app, such as adding more features.
By doing so, Google will also be able to sell more storage space via its cloud offering. This is where Fly Labs enters the scene. The startup – whose sole aim was to create apps that will improve mobile photo and video editing – is a fine product of the New York City tech scene. The Fly Labs team wanted to create an accessible way for content creators to apply video filters that made videos more shareable.
Surprisingly enough, a recent iDigitalTimes revealed that Fly Labs wasn’t looking to explore the Android ecosystem – it wanted to focus solely on what iOS had to offer. And there’s a simple explanation for that; Novikoff explained in an interview that iPhone users have a greater appreciation for good design than Android users.
So even though the software engineers have become experts in iPhone video tech, they’re ready to take Android as their interest. Novikoff added the company is forced to pull its apps from the App Store.
As described in Fly Labs’ announcement post, the startup’s activity is aimed at helping users stay more connected with their memories by offering creative video editing apps. And they’re rather popular; more than 3 million downloads over the past 18 months, and more than 20 million videos created.
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