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Facebook rejected WhatsApp co founder Brian Acton for a job in 2009

Facebook rejected WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton for a job in 2009 383t3s

By NDTV Correspondent | Updated: 20 February 2014 11:38 IST

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Facebook is betting huge on mobile with an eye-popping cash-and-stock deal worth up to $19 billion for Internet Age smartphone messaging service WhatsApp.

The surprise, mega-deal announced on Wednesday bolsters the world's biggest social network - which has more than 1.2 billion - with the 450-million-strong WhatsApp, which will be operated independently with its own board. h1t6x

WhatsApp was founded in 2009 by American Brian Acton and Ukrainian Jan Koum. The acquisition represents quite a turnaround for the duo, who both formerly worked at Yahoo. Before deciding to go on their own and start WhatsApp, it seems Acton was rejected for jobs at Twitter. Here's a tweet by Acton from August 2009:

Facebook turned me down. It was a great opportunity to connect with some fantastic people. Looking forward to life's next adventure.
-- Brian Acton (@brianacton) August 3, 2009

Here's another from May 2009:

Got denied by Twitter HQ. That's ok. Would have been a long commute.
-- Brian Acton (@brianacton) May 23, 2009

Koum, who s Facebook's board under the deal, said: "WhatsApp's extremely high engagement and rapid growth are driven by the simple, powerful and instantaneous messaging capabilities we provide."

In a blog post, Koum added: "Almost five years ago we started WhatsApp with a simple mission: building a cool product used globally by everybody. Nothing else mattered to us."

The tie-up gives WhatsApp "the flexibility to grow and expand," Koum said.

The acquisition represents likely the biggest-ever price for a tech startup, trumping the $8.5 billion paid for Skype - which allows s to make voice and video calls over the Internet - by Microsoft in 2011.

"The size of this deal is really massive and it will get people talking about a bubble," Greg Sterling at Opus Research told AFP.

Written with inputs from AFP

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