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Acquisition of Video Game Streaming Site Twitch by Amazon

Published : 2014-08-26

In a bid to bolster its video game portfolio Amazon.com will acquire Twitch Interactive. Amazon.com has agreed to a $970 million cash deal to purchase the Twitch, which allows gamers to stream videos of their game playing.

Twitch, which spun out of a business launched by former Seattleites Emmett Shear and Justin Kan, is a San Francisco-based social network for gamers. Twitch allows gamers to stream live video feeds of the games that they are playing and also follow gamers who do the same. The app is also available on PlayStation and Xbox platforms.

In July over 55 million unique visitors visited Twitch, viewing over 15 billion minutes of content produced by over 1 million broadcasters.

Founder and CEO of Amazon, Jeff Bezos said that the “global phenomenon” of broadcasting and watching gameplay and said that the company plans to help Twitch move even faster to build new services for the gaming community.

For several years, the e-commerce giant has been building its game business, by purchasing game studios and by adding developer staff. Amazon has also built gaming into its Fire TV streaming-media device, giving its customers a compact-but-limited video-game console.

Vice president of Amazon Games, Mike Frazzini said that acquiring Twitch is another substantial step in this direction for Amazon. The video game streaming site has fundamentally changed how games are used and interacted with, and it’s a service that both gamers and game broadcasters now find hard to live without.

In addition to bolstering Amazon’s gaming portfolio, Twitch could also add to the company’s growing advertising business. Several of Twitch videos include advertising and Amazon has been pushing further into the video-ad business.

Shear said that they are keeping almost everything the same, their employees, their brand, and most importantly their independence. But with Amazon’s support they will have the resources to bring an even better Twitch to people.

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