eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) has announced that it has acquired RedLaser, company which has a play around the Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone. RedLaser is a ‘popular’ barcode scanning application for iPhone. The RedLaser and the related technology was bought from Occipital and the claim is over 2 million downloads. As with many deals, financial terms are not disclosed.
RedLaser is said to be the top-selling iPhone barcode scanning application for comparison shopping and finding product information using a mobile device.
eBay’s goal here appears to be helping shoppers quickly find the best deals online in its mobile efforts and to enable sellers to list their items faster.” eBay indicated that it plans to integrate RedLaser’s barcode scanning technology into its own iPhone applications from eBay Marketplace, eBay Selling, StubHub and Shopping.com applications.
With 2 million downloads already, eBay says that this provides more than 10 million users with access to product information for fast and easy selling and comparison shopping. eBay will immediately transition RedLaser to a free app from a paid application model and plans to immediately boost the selection on RedLaser by integrating more than 200 million listings from eBay.
RedLaser’s technology is being used in a wide grocery shopping lists, gift registries, nutritional tracking, and more; and eBay will obviously plan to expand that out into its many sectors it sells in.
This is an example of a classic bolt-on acquisition. It is obviously not a material transaction and one that is more of a longer-term boost-effect for the company versus an immediate win. If it was a material deal in financial terms, eBay would have to disclose the terms.
JON C. OGG
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