It’s been over three months since Facebook announced it would buy mobile photo sharing application and social network Instagram for a combination of cash and shares worth up to $1 billion, but nothing has come of it yet. When asked about the status of the deal during today’s second quarter earnings call, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s answer was short and to the point, saying as the deal hasn’t closed and there has been no integration between the two companies at all.

Although the transaction was originally pegged to close during Q2, Facebook later changed its estimates to sometime in 2012. It’s likely that a Federal Trade Commission investigation of the deal — a standard procedure for acquisitions over $66 million  — has slowed down the proceedings.

The majority of deals reviewed by the FTC go through after the first, preliminary review, but until the deal is approved, the companies have to operate independently. According to the S-1 Facebook filed in advance of its initial public offering, the company has agreed to pay Instagram a $200 million termination fee if the acquisition doesn’t close.

What we found interesting about Zuckerberg’s comments on the deal were the lack of positive forward-looking statements. He did not say anything about working with the company in the future, or allude to any possible integration. He also declined to provide any additional information about when the deal is expected to close, simply saying that Facebook would issue an update.

The entire deal was reportedly made over a weekend, mostly between Zuckerberg and Instagram founder Kevin Systrom alone. Surprisingly, Facebook launched its own photo filtering and sharing iOS app called Camera just over a month later.

Article courtesy of Inside Facebook

OpenText this morning announced that it has reached an agreement to acquire London-based weComm, which offers cross-platform mobile application deployment software. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

According to OpenText CTO Eugene Roman, weComm’s technology supports the mobility strategy it debuted in 2010 with the introduction of OpenText Everywhere.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Imation, a global developer and marketer of branded products that enable people to store and protect digital information, has acquired ENCRYPTX Corporation, which provides encryption and security solutions for removable storage devices and storage media.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but approximately 10 employees will transfer from ENCRYPTX to Imation.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Imation, a global developer and marketer of branded products that enable people to store and protect digital information, has acquired ENCRYPTX Corporation, which provides encryption and security solutions for removable storage devices and storage media.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but approximately 10 employees will transfer from ENCRYPTX to Imation.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Cisco this morning announced that it has completed its acquisition of privately-held Pari Networks, a provider of network configuration and change management solutions, in an effort to complement its own ‘smart service’ capabilities. Pari Networks, notably, was founded by a group of former Cisco executives.

Cisco originally announced its intent to buy Pari Networks on January 26, 2011. Financial terms of the deal remain undisclosed, but Pari Networks employees are to become part of Cisco’s Technical Services.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Group-buy social commerce platform LivingSocial just knocked competitor Groupon off the #1 spot, in terms of running the most popular group-buy deal ever award, at least, netting over 1m transactions.  Last month, Amazon invested $175m in LivingSocial, and yesterday the two celebrated the union, with a $10 for a $20 Amazon voucher deal, which runs until 8am ET (US) today (Jan 20).

Until yesterday, the most successful (in terms of purchase volume) group-buy deal had been Groupon’s Gap deal last August, ringing up 441,000 purchases for a $50 Gap voucher at 1/2 price ($25) in one day ($11m revenue), selling – at one point – 10 deals a second.

But by noon yesterday, 19 Jan 2011, that record had been beaten by the LivingSocial deal, ringing up just shy of half a million transactions. By late-afternoon, 3/4 of a million transactions had been processed, and by early evening – one million deals had been sold, selling at a rate of 20/second. In terms of deal value, LivingSocial had to wait until later in the evening to take the crown, surging past the $11m revenue mark.  By midnight 1,239,482 deals had been sold ($12.4m sales).

Earlier in the evening, 67 news articles had appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Wired, Huffington Post, USA Today and others, as the deal went viral on social media, racking up 42,715 Facebook shares and 6,762 Twitter shares.  One of the distinguishing features of LivingSocial (10m subscribers, 170 cities) vs. its bigger brother Groupon (50m subscribers 400+ cities) is the extra social layer the social commerce platform adds to the deal; you get the deal for free if three of your friends with whom you share the deal, buy into the deal. This of course, drives online word of mouth and social media shares.

So what should we make of this?  No doubt brand marketers will again lament the use of brand-eroding price promotions, as they did with the Groupon Gap deal.  We’ll hear that any fool can sell at a loss, and there must be more to social commerce than brand-toxic price promotions.  But as part owner of LivingSocial, it’s in Amazon’s own interest to drive the popularity of LivingSocial, currently the number #2 group-buy social commerce platform.  And in the context of the mooted IPO for Groupon this spring, LivingSocial could benefit from any halo effect of enhanced visibility.  The two social commerce platforms are also vying finalists for best social commerce app in this year’s tech oscars, the Crunchies – could this record-breaking buzz snatch victory from Groupon?

For us, three initial thoughts strike us from the LivingSocial Amazon deal.

• Firstly, it’s another proof-point that for social commerce to work, you have to offer something remarkable – either by adding value or reducing cost.  This is because, jargon-aside, social commerce is simply word of mouth in the context of retail – and word of mouth only happens when you have something worth talking about.  Simply replicating your store in Facebook won’t cut the mustard.
• Secondly, the deal points to the emergence of social commerce platforms that blur or bin the boundaries between online flash sales (Woot, Gilt et al.) and group-buy local deals (Groupon, LivingSocial).  Just as Groupon is running online deals with e-tailers, and Gilt is running deals with local retailers, LivingSocial is now offering realtime deals for online and offline stores.  Expect more of this.
• Thirdly, the deal also points to the power of partnerships in the social commerce space, just as consumer good giant P&G partnered Amazon to sell on Facebook last year, LivingSocial adds a fresh live-shopping dimension to Amazon, the grand-dame of e-commerce.  Expect to see more partnerships and collaborations between brands, retailers and social technology companies in 2011.

Excuse us now, we have to go spend a fistful of Amazon vouchers.

Article courtesy of Social Commerce Today

So the world’s largest retailer has taken a leaf out of the book of the world’s fastest growing company to spearhead its social media strategy in the world’s largest social network.

Walmart has launched CrowdSaver, a weekly Groupon-style app in Facebook that is triggered only if enough people ‘like’ the deal (see variations of the theme from Skoda and Uniqlo similar).  In order to Like the deal, you have to Like Walmart – ensuring Walmart news is added to your news feed.  Smart.

Last week’s first deal saw 5000+ people liking a deal for a 42″ plasma television – at $398 – an 18% discount to the in-store price.  In week 2, Walmart is experimenting with a low cost seasonal item, a personalized Halloween photo mug ($6 – at 40% off). With 1500 likes, the deal is on.

Over at thetrendwatch, Seinn Schlidt summarises why CrowdSaver is smart

• Control - Allowing the retailer complete control of each and every deal.
• Recruitment - Requiring people to “like” Walmart, before they can like a deal.
• Engagement - Motivating the existing community to rally their friends to like a deal and to check back each week for a new deal.
• Data - Helping Walmart understand “who” likes “what” and “how” likes convert to sales.

Interestingly, CrowdSaver deals are open to all – once the magic number of Facebook “Likes” has been reached (the number changes from week to week), the price is dropped on Walmart’s e-commerce site, and everyone can participate (one purchase per customer).

Walmart’s senior director of digital strategy, Wanda Young, emphasizes that CrowdSaver is a work in progress and Walmart will be experimenting with variations based on feedback and participation.  Here’s our opinion on how CrowdSaver could be developed.

1. Make the deal exclusive to Facebook fans – currently, there’s no quid pro quo from Walmart for fan engagement – everybody can profit from the deal
2. Allow purchase to be made within Facebook with a CrowdSaver Shop tab – currently CrowdSaver is being used to generate site traffic for Walmart’s e-commerce site – why oblige customers to click and go elsewhere?
3. Make deal purchases in Facebook viral with an Alvenda-style newsfeed store – so purchases get syndicated across Facebook, with the opportunity to buy directly from within the newsfeed
4. Employ active pricing, this more Likes, the better the deal
5. Run CrowdSaver onsite, on Walmart’s main e-commerce site – using the Facebook “Like” social plugin – thus not obliging customers to move between two sites (think Levi’s friends store)
6. Incorporate YouTube “Likes” into the offer, to encourage customers to see the ad for the product – See the Ad, Like the Ad, get the Deal
7. Add promotional videos into Crowdsaver Facebook page that can be liked and syndicated across networks
8. Include a mechanism to get customer commitment (currently Liking doesn’t commit you to anything) – for example, allow people to pay upfront at a set price, and then receive e-vouchers for future purchases based on the number purchases made
9. Integrate the deal in-store – with aisle check-ins (e.g. shopkick), or physical in-store Like buttons on the shelf
10. Extend the impact by offering discount vouchers for future purchases if deals are reviewed online (onsite or on review sites such as Yelp)

Like other commentators, we ‘like’ Walmart’s CrowdSaver Facebook app, and we expect f-commerce solution providers such as Alvenda, Wildfire or Payvment will be looking closely at its ongoing success – with a view to offering a Facebook Flash-Sale app – with group-buy functionality to their wares. Gap and The Body Shop notwithstanding, the CrowdSaver model is more brand and retailer-friendly than the Groupon model; there’s no discounting by 75% (in the Groupon world) customers get 50% off, and Groupon takes a 50% cut of what’s paid).

In terms of social commerce opportunities for 2011, a Facebook CrowdSaver App should be on your radar – whether you’re a retailer, brand, agency or developer.

Article courtesy of Social Commerce Today

IBM is making another acquisition today, buying up computer security software company BigFix. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

BigFix security software identifies all of a company’s PCs, laptops, server and then monitors and flags IT administrators when devices are not in compliance with corporate IT security standards. BigFix’s software promises to make security fixes across at least 500,000 machines in a matter of minutes.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Oracle is acquiring Secerno, an Oxford, UK-based provider of database firewall solutions for Oracle and non-Oracle databases. The terms of the agreement were not disclosed, and Oracle expects the transaction to close before the end of June 2010.

Until the deal closes, each company will continue to operate independently.

Secerno’s solution adds a critical defensive layer of security around databases, which blocks unauthorized activity in real-time.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

SpringSource (which VMware acquired last year) is buying GemStone Systems, a company that provides enterprise data management solutions. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

GemStone’s flagship product is GemFire Enterprise, a scalable, distributed data platform that dynamically puts data where it is needed across a network to remove latency. Other GemStone products include GemFire SQLFabric, a memory-oriented SQL data management platform and GemStone/S, a platform for running distributed Smalltalk applications.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch