Meta Giphy sells to Shutterstock at a huge loss

Make your conversations colorful with animated GIFs: Almost everyone does. Giphy is often used for this, which is an app that adds a GIF keyboard to the system. Meta bought the platform at the end of 2021 and paid $400 million (€371 million) at that time. The program is immediately integrated into all platforms: Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.

Now, Facebook’s parent company is selling the GIF service again — and at a huge loss. Meta has one an agreement Closed to photography platform Shutterstock, which will be adding Giphy animations and stickers to its catalog. The company is paying around $53m (€49m) for this – far less than Meta paid at the end of 2021.

Not that Meta left a lot of options. Shortly after Meta acquired Giphy, the UK privacy watchdog launched an investigation into the acquisition. The social media giant has been fined $69.6m (€64.8m) for failing to obtain prior approval from the agency. A few months later, the company was told that approval would not be forthcoming. Meta had no choice but to sell the company again.

GIFs and stickers on Shutterstock

So the Facebook parent is now selling the platform, at a loss, to Shutterstock. However, not much should change for users of meta services and Giphy. Part of the deal is that the service will continue to work on Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Those who use Shutterstock will see some changes: in addition to regular photos, stickers and GIFs will soon be introduced.