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Apple Said to Acquire Color
- ctide 14y agoIf you didn't think the patent system was fucked up before, you sure as fuck should know now.
- signa11 14y agoif you don't mind may you please elaborate on the above post in the context of this headline ? thank you !
- hrabago 14y agoBecause the report says Apple's interest may be in Color's patents.
- raganwald 14y agoHere's the real color.com VC pitch, not the fake one they distributed. ===== "Look, we want a bunch of money from you VCs. A LOT of it. Here's what we've got: Some great patents, and the prospect of some more as we continue R&D. More importantly, these patents are in a strategically critical space where Google, Samsung, Apple, and Microsoft are all vying for supremacy. "So here's what we're going to do with your money: Either (a) Shake a bunch of people down for big bucks, in which case we'll need your money for legal fees. Only we may not need it, but knowing we can afford to pay lawyers will make the big guys settle. Or (b) Sell the patents. "Yeah, we anticipated the "We don't fund patent trolls" objection. Here are the bullshit products we plan to roll out. Sure they suck, but they buy us credibility in the valley as an operating entity. Nobody will accuse you of funding a troll. "And hey, one of these dogs with fleas may actually catch on, you never know. If not, we shoot it and make another, we just call it "pivoting" while we carry on negotiations for patent royalties. "Whaddya say, how does M$40 sound, plus an extra mil so we can say "The low forties" on the press release?"
- bbhacker 14y agoSource? If true, brilliance on Bill Ngyuens end and shame on the tech press for not getting it.
- hack_edu 14y agoThing is, they tech press do get it. Probably more than us. But we keep clicking through to their articles; that's how they make money.
- scarmig 14y agoI get that this is supposed to be comedic satire. But it really does have the ring of truth to it.
- Galaxier 14y agoSeems legit, and they asked for 40 million only. I would have given more cos the pitch is the best
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- Lukeas14 14y agoAccording to this article and others those 6 patents are all still pending meaning they haven't yet been accepted by the PTO as valid patents. For less than $400 any of us can file a provisional patent with the PTO that would allow you to claim patent pending status. So unless Apple's lawyers are certain they'll be accepted they aren't worth much of anything right now.
- newhouseb 14y agoYou're correct, but in the case of patent acquisitions in many cases having a claim of priority (i.e. filing/invention date) is far more important than whether a patent is granted or not. In any patent litigation, the defendant will argue that a patent is invalid regardless of if it's actually been published. In other words, when you look at a patent, you can concretely say a couple things: a) what prior art exists and b) what the priority date is. You would like to say c) is this a viable patent, but even if the USPTO grants a patent this is never set in stone (thanks to the court system). Edit: sounds like the priority dates are all in 2011, which isn't particularly early, still a little dumbfounded.
- Apocryphon 14y agoWhen has there ever been a wild (non-obvious) Apple acquisition rumor that was substantiated?
- bradsmithinc 14y agoSiri and Chomp both come to mind. So does LaLa.
- Apocryphon 14y agoI'm not sure if these were so wild, since they don't seem to be companies as high-profile or controversial as Color. Siri is somewhat wild insofar most people didn't expect that Apple was working on such a project. I'm talking more about the Apple will buy Twitter/EA/RIM stories. http://technologizer.com/2011/07/29/a-brief-history-of-apple-not-buying-things/ http://technologizer.com/2011/07/29/a-brief-history-of-apple...
- k-mcgrady 14y agoI would say they are more high profile than Color. The only reason we think of Color as high profile is because it was a failure. Anyone outside of our bubble will never have heard of it. Siri and Chomp were both successful and had a lot of users. People actually cared when they were shut down. I doubt many people will care if Color gets shut down.
- mukaiji 14y agoMy HN timeline for today: (morning) "Color to be shutting down" (afternoon) "Color IS NOT shutting down" (evening) "Color is acquired by Apple" wtf just happened.
- jpdoctor 14y agoSomeone on the board of Apple is a limited partner of investors in Color?
- notJim 14y agoThat timeline actually gives you a really good description of "what just happened", and for several values of "just." :D
- lifeformed 14y ago(midnight) "Color to acquire Apple"
- ChuckMcM 14y agoTo answer the question: "wtf just happened." If you have ever seen the TV show "House" [1] its the part where each doctor makes a different diagnosis and Dr. House keeps trying to fit all the pieces together to get to the real issue. Clearly Color is in a state of transition, I know of no company with an absent CEO, and no COO, that are stable. The tech "press" is in a feeding frenzy trying to be the first to 'diagnose' the cause and the eventual effect. Apparently its a solid bullet point in one's blogume' to say "I broke the <company> story." [1] The TV series House as written up by Wikipedia : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_(TV_series) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_(TV_series)
- bane 14y agoSo is this Color, soon to be seen in the iPhone 5s?
- lostlogin 14y agoColor was introduced to the iPod touch a few weeks back, so maybe.
- unreal37 14y agoI for one am shocked that The Next Web seems to have done some original reporting here, and not just copying someone else's blog post word for word.[1] Unless of course the original source blog post for this can be found somewhere... [1]http://daringfireball.net/linked/2012/05/14/next-web-dirtbaggery http://daringfireball.net/linked/2012/05/14/next-web-dirtbag...
- eliajf 14y agoSad if true, for all the hardworking companies out there that are working very hard to make a difference in customer's lives. Only overpriced products with no product/market fit can be acquired for "high double digit" millions.
- greendestiny 14y agoI think its probably more to do with large number of patents they claimed to have for localization and sharing. At least that was the hype at the time of their funding.
- ctrl_freak 14y agoI don't think Apple buys up companies due to "hype", and considering the amount of negative press Color has been receiving as of late, that seems especially unlikely here. More likely it is a talent acquisition, or as greendestiny suggests, patents.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- 31reasons 14y agoIts all about relationships with people I guess. It reminds me of this excerpt from a psychology book. "People used to look out on the playground and say that the boys were playing soccer and the girls where doing nothing. But the girls weren't doing nothing- They were talking. They were talking about the world to one another. And they became very expert about that in a way the boys did not" You can replace 'boys' with 'developers' and 'girls' with 'tech socialites'.
- timerickson 14y agoI've been a quiet fan of Color since the beginning, from a technology/team standpoint, not a product standpoint. I think its smart for Apple. We can all agree that the product launch and the product itself was terribly implemented, but that doesn't mean the technology behind it can't be impressive. It also doesn't have to mean that Apple can't make good use of the technology and talent at Color by embedding them into existing teams and apps.
- danso 14y agoWhat technology exactly? Their initial tech claims (which were never verified or detectable in real world usage) were impressive. Their pivot made little mention of using that tech. What tech of Color's can we conclusively say actually works in the real world?
- snogglethorpe 14y agoNot to mention: "Do I need a Facebook Account to use Color? Yes, your Color account is directly linked to your Facebook account. Everything you do on Color, including photo taking and LIVE video Broadcasting, will be represented on Facebook " Ugh...
- pixelmonkey 14y agoIt was obvious from day one that Color was going to be acquired for a pretty penny. It's even in their pitch deck: http://www.slideshare.net/kitseeborg/color-faux-pitch-ddeck http://www.slideshare.net/kitseeborg/color-faux-pitch-ddeck See slide 45: "We're going to flip this bitch like flipper!"
- mikescar 14y agoIn the 'faux pitch deck'? It's called a joke. Or did you really think after Slide 2: "Colors: people love that shit" this was a real pitch deck?
- pixelmonkey 14y agoWow, apparently my attempt at sarcasm on the Internet failed with some people. Yes, I know the slide deck is a joke. sigh
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- ericdykstra 14y ago"High double digits" seems like a lot to pay for color.com and @color (although it is a great domain and handle). Maybe they have some really cool patents that they can use to sue Samsung or Google for $500 million and make the acquisition a net profit.
- ezpassmac 14y agoThey do have some patent for HD video, battery, and more. Up to 6 is what I've read.
- wmf 14y agoAre you valuing all their employees combined at zero?
- dmor 14y agoHard to imagine counting on employees staying
- codewright 14y agoI've talked to some of their more critical engineers. They're bailing ASAP. It's a shit-show there (at Color).
- batgaijin 14y agoNguyen is the Mr. Magoo of startups.
- te_chris 14y agoOr the Underpants Gnomes? If only he'd share what the "???" are.
- pbreit 14y agoConsidering it likely has double digit millions of dollars left in the bank, sounds low.
- jonnathanson 14y agoIt's entirely possible that Apple saw, in Color, the ability to acquire some valuable patents, talent, or capabilities at fire sale prices that it would spend a lot more trying to develop in house. Remember that distressed assets in one company's hands are highly productive assets in a different company's hands. If the company actually has been run into the ground, all the better for Apple, because it can get a steeper discount on the assets it's after.
- rdl 14y agoI'm surprised Palantir didn't buy them just to take over their prime downtown Palo Alto real estate leases (one of the few big spaces not taken already by Palantir...)
- newhouseb 14y agoWell, their current office space is technically illegal as at least the ground floor is zoned for retail. Remember how they had that silly little handwritten note on the (always locked) door that said "hi! We're color, come on in and say hi!"? That, apparently was enough (undoubtedly with their sway with the local govt) to fulfill the requirement that all places zoned for retail be accessible to the public.
- rdl 14y agoI can't believe I hadn't thought of that -- I always thought the big "public cafeteria, come join us for lunch" thing on the ground floor was just space-banking and showing off, and using it as a recruiting tool. Zoning makes a lot more sense (I remember PA whining at Facebook for using that building over on Hamilton for the customer service offices, the one with the nice frosted glass Facebook text on the retail windowfront...)
- petercooper 14y agoAs a fellow member of our startup world, congratulations to Color! They deserved success after spotting the opportunity the new mobile era presents for transforming the way people share the stories of their lives. Their constant innovating and striving to learn and grow was sure to bring them plentiful benefits.
- JabavuAdams 14y agoWow, that sounded authentic. I think I just barfed a little in my mouth.
- petercooper 14y agoIf it makes it any better, most of the phrasing was from their About page.
- beedogs 14y agoWow, their actual About page reads like a bunch of potheads started writing an "About" page and got distracted. http://www.color.com/about http://www.color.com/about
- iag 14y agoThis might be the first time I am using the downvote button after 3+ years on HN... click
- cjensen 14y agoThere's no reason for Apple to buy Color. A couple of patents on recently invented stuff? Unlikely. Buying the patents would make sense, not buying the company. Acquire a team? Why not just hire them? Is the team really that attached to a company going nowhere? So I call this rumor nonsense. On the other hand, if this rumor is true it says a lot about Apple management and none of it good.
- eliajf 14y agoPersonally, I'd give Apple's management the benefit of the doubt.
- r00fus 14y agoAnd Google buying MOTO for $12B is good management? Motorola hasn't really produced anything of value since acquisition for Google aside from the patent pool. $XXM is a drop in the bucket for Apple - they could fund 10x that without blinking if the patents were deemed to be worth it. They have 10000x that in the bank already.
- cjensen 14y agoGoogle bought MOTO for the patents. Major portfolios like Motorola's have been going for a lot of money lately. So while I think it was a poor investment, it really depends on whether or not that huge portfolio is useful to Google. Color has nothing comparable.
- teflonhook 14y agoWrong company - apparently its "Silicon Color" not "Color" that got bought. http://appleinsider.com/article/?id=2147 http://appleinsider.com/article/?id=2147
- jimboyoungblood 14y agoNot to be confused with "Apple acquires Silicon Color" http://appleinsider.com/article/?id=2147 http://appleinsider.com/article/?id=2147
- powera 14y agoOctober 16, 2006 (article date) is also not to be confused with October 16, 2012.
- clobber 14y agoPost from Gruber today about Color: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2012/10/17/color-shut-down http://daringfireball.net/linked/2012/10/17/color-shut-down > Like I Said, $41 Million Down the Toilet
- raganwald 14y agoTo be fair, the whole quote was: > This thing looks like a turd to me. Now, maybe I’m the idiot and the joke’s on me and Color is going to be a huge hit. But my figurative money says that the investors who funded these guys just flushed $41 million in literal money down the toilet. So the first half of his prediction was correct, color the product was a turd. Actually, a double-turd since their pivot seemed to change the product from manure to guano. He simply didn't predict what may be a seller's market for strategic patents and their role within it. Which is why he's a journalist and not a VC. His brain isn't devious enough (an neither is mine!).
- plinkplonk 14y agoI eagerly await Gruber's 'pivot' on his opinion about Color, if Apple - the company that can do no wrong and is really playing 11 dimensional chess (as per his blog) - really acquired it.
- megablast 14y agoGruber is plenty critical of Apple, look at his analysis of Apple maps. He justifies why they had to do it, but still agrees it is not ready.
- cookiecaper 14y agoHeh, he is not critical of Apple at all in that piece. He grudingly accepts that the new Maps wasn't ready, but spends the rest of it begging us to forgive them because big mean Google wouldn't give Apple what they wanted for cheap. :(
- jowiar 14y agoIF this is actually true, I can sort of see the fit. Apple is very good at turning pieces into products. Color, clearly, isn't, but may be very good at producing pieces that have value in the proper hands. I'm throwing this out there to stimulate discussion a bit, and there's a pretty good chance I get downvoted for saying it, but there's an argument to be made that this actually is a success for the patent system. Companies founded on "get a bunch of smart people together and innovate" should be something that we encourage as a society. They create value, and there should be a structure to encourage this to actually happen. I'm not sure that academia should have a monopoly on this sort, and patents are the other current method of doing this.
- traughber 14y agolol!
- shmerl 14y agoLooking at the title, I thought for a moment that Apple tried to patent some color %) They did already patent rectangular shapes after all ;)
- bowmessage 14y agoInteresting... these guys had a heavy presence at my campus last year (Texas A&M University) but have since been nowhere to be found. I know of no one that uses the app anymore at all, not many people did in the first place. It should be interesting to see what Apple does with this acquisition.
- pbreit 14y agoAre the sources sure that the rumors don't refer to Silicon Color which was reported yesterday?
- aresant 14y agoApple just jumped the shark if this is true. Bill Nguyen is massively talented at making things work for Bill Nguyen - his prior business bought by Apple for ~$80m, Lala.com, was lackluster at best. Under Jobs you could kind of, sort of get your head around $80m for essentially a talent acquisition in streaming / digital music which is/was an important revenue stream for AAPL. But even under Jobs the supposed golden boy, Nguyen, bailed. Taking his vision and some of his best people with him. So I see this as "Apple makes the same mistake twice" - and if Apple is going to jump into the "social around you, bullshit, blah blah blah" game through this acquisition I am truly sad.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- siglesias 14y agoLast I checked iTunes Match, which is the child of the Lala team, is working pretty well.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- alanh 14y agoSarcasm? I’m an iTunes Match user, and while I love the dream, the reality isn’t quite there yet. The experience is pretty choppy, even confusing. (No, I’m not talking about buffering streams.)
- ryguytilidie 14y agoConsidering iTunes match is one of the best things I've ever used I'm going to say no sarcasm and that you're in the minority.
- tolmasky 14y agoiTunes Match would have been the best thing I ever used had it come out one (or more) years earlier. Instead, it arrived after I had already tried Spotify, and by then I had tried something better.
- andyjsong 14y agoI'm gonna get downloaded, but seriously, fuck this.
- robryan 14y agoIf true this might actually make it even easier for Nguyen to raise in future. If they have done little right and managed to deliver a return on a $40mil investment.
- lawrence 14y agoI would downvote this story if I could. Color operates in a parallel bizarro world that most of us will, thank god, never know. $40M in funding and no users? Check. Three months off to Hawaii as founding CEO? Check. CEO who says he would pivot if he was back in the office? Check. Move along, there's nothing to see here.
- k-mcgrady 14y agoSo you would downvote a story because of jealousy? Whatever your opinion on Color it's still an important story and something other Hackers obviously care about. The fact someone can get funded so much money, completely fail, and then get bailed out says a lot about our industry.
- cft 14y agoFor a modern software developer, news like this mean: focus on Android.
- rimantas 14y agoYou must have some strange definition of "modern".
- radicaldreamer 14y agoProbably a good way to build the next generation of Photo Streams in iOS.
- pclark 14y agoI would have liked to see Hacker News applauding Bill Nugyen for landing in such a way if these rumours are true. Colour has a team, with no products nor leadership and they're going to sell for tens of millions of dollars. To the most successful company on the planet.
- beedogs 14y agowell, it's frankly kind of embarrassing.
- etfb 14y agoMy gods I hate "said to". Headline-writer "English" deserves to be consigned to the same cess pit as Church Latin and segmented memory addressing.
- madaxe 14y agoOh good. Another failed startup with massive over investment, a sucky product and no revenue gets bought for megabucks. Nepotism and back-room deals abound.
- jdevonport 14y agoIf Apple has done this it would make me really consider their management's judgement. Color has never been a successful business or even an innovator in its space. From what I can tell they never even considered how to monetize the company, on that basis it should be allowed to go bust. I can't see what value there is there apart from the team, and that isn't worth a blockbuster sum.
- nicholassmith 14y agoWell if it's true it would go some way towards explaining why Color took a fair few hours after the story broke to say "No, we're not shutting down", if the deal is there it's quite likely they'd need to speak to all sides (board, investors, potential Apple negotiations etc). If Apple pay $40mil for it then they're as stupid as a sack of rocks. If they've ponied up $10-20mil as a talent grab I can kind of see it. Either way we're talking about pocket change to a company with as much cash reserve as Apple, but if I was an investor I'd be interested in hearing why Apple thought it was a good idea.
- Tycho 14y agoIt will be interesting to analyse this once we know more. Previous Apple acquisitions went quiet for a while but then became part of Apples plans in a big way: Siri, Inc. --> Siri PA Semi --> A6 chips in Apple devices Lala --> iTunes Match I suppose the difference is that they all had viable products prior to acquisition. But what I'm thinking is that Color have been working on stuff which is quite clearly close to Apples photo offerings (cameras in all their devices, photo stream, iCloud, gps, Facebook integration). How much would it cost Apple to develop all that stuff? A few million I guess. But what would the oppurtunity cost be of Apple putting one of their development teams to work on these features? A lot more (judging by how much Apple's profits keep growing). Apple don't have enough staff to capitalise on all the oppurtunities that they have (hence their massive pile of unspent cash). They can only do so much at once. But what if they find a project basically tailor made to their standards (strategically aligned, patented to the gills, high quality code-base, iOS compatibility)? Might make sense to spend their pocket money and just acquire it for a somewhat inflated price.
- jballanc 14y agoNope, this doesn't smell right... In fact, this smells like an intentional leak by someone on Color's side in an effort to boost their price to some other potential buyer (counting on Apple's legendary no-comment streak to bolster the appearance of the rumor). Think about the last time something leaked about an Apple acquisition before the deal was closed...right, never! In fact, Apple has notoriously remained quiet about acquisitions even after they close. They are not a company that does a triumphal sounding press release for every acquisition. Yeah, occasionally you get leaks about Apple products. You think those aren't intentional? You think Apple's not leaking just enough about their upcoming products to keep people's interest. That's their game. But leaking information about an acquisition? What does that gain Apple? If Apple really did want to purchase Color, leaking that information would only raise their price. No, the only entity here that benefits from a leak like this is Color. If the rumor turns out to be true, the fact that details of an acquisition were leaked is much more concerning to me than the particulars of what company and for how much.
- salimmadjd 14y agoI'd second your assertions. I've met one of Color's employees(in products team) early on and walked away thinking this company is going nowhere. Not sure what apple is gaining by buying this company. Frankly, they'd been better off buying NIK Software. If they are truly buying Color they're out of their minds.
- napierzaza 14y agoSo at one point we all thought it was a mistake. But now it's apparent that Apple really wants to have the bodies of failed social networks piled around itself for some reason.
- AznHisoka 14y agoThe startup Gods are just messing with our heads. "Color raises 40 Million" -"OMG.. we're in a bubble" -"Ridiculous... waste of money" "Color is about to shut down" - "See I told you so" - "Ha.. saw that coming" "Color acquired by Apple" - "WTH is going on?" - "I work 100 times as hard making a product people want! Where's my payday?!!"