Pretty sure they bought Insta and Whatsapp. I mean, that's not nothing, buying a successful business and keeping it successful for over a decade. But neither Zuck nor Meta made those platforms; they were both established successes in their own right before acquisition.

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matwood 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

> keeping it successful

I’m no Zuck fan, but he’s done much more than keep them successful, they have grown a lot.

I remember everyone making fun of him for overpaying for IG and WA. Now both in hindsight look like amazing acquisitions.

	▲	alex1138 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		The "amazing acquisitions" should be antitrust. Whatsapp is a non starter given what Brian Acton reported. I'll never use it. People widely report they ruined Instagram and Zuck came back furiously explaining in an email chain later "oh sorry I didn't mean to say we're killing the competition" probably after a lawyer scolded him

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stephbook 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Only The Zuck saw the value though. Why didn't MS, Amazon or Google buy insta? Or some Softbank vehicle?

	▲	afavour 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I’m sure the others saw the value too. It just wasn’t worth as much to them as Zuckerberg was prepared to pay. Not surprising given it’s a service that directly competed with FB in the social space.
	▲	b00ty4breakfast 2 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Probably because Instagram wasn't a direct competitor to any of those other companies (except maybe Google+, which wasn't even a year old at the time that FB bought Instagram). I don't know why softbank didn't get them.

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hn_throwaway_99 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This is the case with most tech companies. Google bought Android, YouTube, DoubleClick, Maps, etc. etc.

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happymellon 2 days ago | parent [-]

Although in this case Meta bought companies that were already established and successful.

Google bought Android before it had released products.

Google Maps was purchased, but was Where 2 actually a successful product prior to that?

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hn_throwaway_99 2 days ago | parent [-]

I feel like you just cherry picked from my examples. YouTube was certainly successful - Google bought them because their own Google Video competitor was a flop. DoubleClick was also obviously huge. Where 2 had a successful product, it just wasn't web based (nor do I think free), so didn't have anywhere near the distribution that Google enabled once the team ported it to run in a browser.

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magicalist 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

I think there is a difference in at least degree here (maybe in kind, idk) that's lost by lumping them purely on acquisition or not, but I do largely agree with your point.

But just wanted to correct for the historical record:

> Where 2 had a successful product, it just wasn't web based (nor do I think free), so didn't have anywhere near the distribution that Google enabled once the team ported it to run in a browser.

Where 2 did not have a product, successful or not. They were an unreleased demo looking for investors and luckily got into a room with Larry Page of 2004.

	▲	happymellon a day ago \| parent [-]
		Indeed, I think they used bad examples as neither Android or Where 2 were successful, but it also shows that Google has done a mix of buying something successful to fill a gap or find someone with a good tech that they help to get over the line and make successful. Meta has not shown the second part.

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happymellon a day ago | parent | prev [-]

I "cherry picked" from your examples because they weren't really good examples.

You said

> buying a successful business and keeping it successful for over a decade.

Meta bought already successful companies.

Google has purchased successful businesses, but they also purchased companies that weren't and managed to get them into massive money makers.

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disgruntledphd2 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Instagram had around 10mn users at acquisition, so they might not have gotten to where they are without FB. Whatsapp was a successful product that didn't make any money.

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eloisant 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

They used the Facebook app to spy on smartphone users and detect Instagram and WhatsApp success to decide to buy them.