Twitter scoops up Bluefin Labs to monetize second-screen experiences

February 6, 2013 | By Jason Ankeny

Twitter has acquired social TV analytics firm Bluefin Labs. Financial terms were not disclosed, although sources told Business Insider the deal is Twitter's largest to date, indicating the purchase price exceeds the $40 million spent to purchase TweetDeck in May 2011.

Bluefin Labs offers data tracking products and services to brand advertisers, agencies and television networks. "We believe that Bluefin's data science capabilities and social TV expertise will help us create innovative new ad products and consumer experiences in the exciting intersection of Twitter and TV," said Twitter COO Ali Rowghani, adding the deal builds on the company's exclusive partnership with Nielsen to develop the Twitter TV Rating, which will provide industry-standard metrics tracking Twitter usage in relation to broadcast viewing patterns.

Twitter activity inspired by television viewing has emerged as a critical component of the social media platform's traffic: Users posted more than 24.1 million tweets related to Sunday's Super Bowl telecast and halftime show, for example, with the game's now-infamous power outage generating 231,000 tweets per minute. "While our products have always included data from multiple social media services, the reality is that Twitter is the platform where the overwhelming majority--about 95 percent--of public real-time engagement with TV happens," Bluefin Labs said in a blog post confirming the deal.

Both the Bluefin and Nielsen deals offer Twitter new opportunities to monetize these second-screen experiences, helping establish clear usage metrics to share with advertisers. Rowghani said Twitter will honor existing Bluefin customer contracts, but will not continue to sell the Bluefin product suite beyond deals already in place.

For more:
- read this Twitter Blog entry
- read this Bluefin Labs blog entry
- read this Business Insider article