In its first-ever acquisition, Mozilla has purchased the save-it-later app Pocket to help grow its presence on mobile.
Pocket will bring its more than 10 million monthly active users to the internet company, where it will continue to work as an independent subsidiary. The mobile app will continue to allow people to discover, save and share content such as articles or video to view later.
Mozilla and Pocket have long collaborated. When the bookmarking service first launched in 2007, it began as a Firefox add-on. In 2015, the companies expanded their partnership to build Pocket directly into the Firefox browser. In a blog post Monday, Pocket CEO Nate Weiner said the acquisition expands on this relationship.
“How does Mozilla fit into this equation? They’re adding fuel to our rocketship,” Weiner wrote. “We have worked closely with Mozilla as we partnered with their Firefox team, and established a deep trust with their team and vision. They have extraordinary resources, global scale, and reach to put Pocket in more places, and help us build an even better product, faster.”
The deal will help Pocket grow its audience and compete with similar apps such as Instapaper, which was acquired by Pinterest last August.
Under the acquisition, Pocket will work as a new product alongside the Firefox browsers. In addition to growing Pocket as a discovery tool, Mozilla said it plans to use the company’s technology to build a system to recommend content. It will also be part of Mozilla’s open source project.
“We believe that the discovery and accessibility of high quality web content is key to keeping the internet healthy by fighting against the rising tide of centralization and walled gardens,” Mozilla CEO Chris Beard said in the press release. “Pocket provides people with the tools they need to engage with and share content on their own terms, independent of hardware platform or content silo, for a safer, more empowered and independent online experience.”
