LinkedIn Acquires Pulse in an attempt to become a "definitive professional publishing platform"

After months of rumors flying around, LinkedIn has announced its acquisition of Pulse, the popular mobile news reader app for smartphones. TechCrunch reports that the app has been acquired for $90 Million in stock and cash. The acquisition is set to close in the second quarter of 2013.

Deep Nishar, Senior Vice President, Products & User Experience at LinkedIn, posted in the LinkedIn blog, where he shares, among other things, the intention of this acquisition. Here are some excerpts from the blog post -

"We believe LinkedIn can be the definitive professional publishing platform – where all professionals come to consume content and where publishers come to share their content. Millions of professionals are already starting their day on LinkedIn to glean the professional insights and knowledge they need to make them great at their jobs. We believe we can help all professionals make smarter and more informed business decisions leveraging all the great business knowledge flowing through LinkedIn in the form of news, Influencer posts, industry updates, discussions, comments and more."

"Pulse is a perfect complement to this vision. Pulse’s core value proposition is to help foster informed discussions that spark the decisions shaping the world around us through news and information. This shared view that the power of professional information and knowledge can transform lives and the world makes LinkedIn and Pulse a particularly great fit. We couldn’t be more thrilled to be working side by side with the Pulse team to create new and better ways to help professionals contribute to and leverage this collective body of business knowledge to help them be great at what they do and from wherever they work"

Holding true to Nishar's comment, the first change in the Pulse app is the inclusion of LinkedIn's influencer posts in the app. The pulse team said -- "To celebrate this milestone, we’re happy to offer a brand new LinkedIn Influencer feed on Pulse, filled with posts by luminaries like Richard Branson, Jack Welch, and more. It’s the first of many opportunities ahead, and we can’t wait for you to see what’s next."

The app will continue to work the same way for its existing 30 million users as the Pulse team confirmed, "With LinkedIn by our side, our team will continue to make Pulse the best it can be. We’re still working together on the product you love, and will continue to provide an innovative and visual news reading experience. For now, the Pulse apps will remain the same, and our two teams are excited to work together to create cool and useful new offerings."

Here is a small presentation explaining more about the acquisition -