San Francisco (AFP)
Google plans to buy Firework, a start-up that has developed a free video sharing application similar to TikTok, according to an article in the US daily The Wall Street Journal on Friday.
On the model of TikTok (owned by the Chinese group ByteDance) - which is a huge success with a very popular public, teens - Firework application can share short and original videos.
Launched last year by former executives of Snap, LinkedIn and JPMorgan Chase, the California start-up has been valued at more than $ 100 million in a fundraiser this year, according to the daily.
He said that Weibo, the Chinese Twitter, also expressed interest, but without going so far in the discussion.
"Firework is the future of mobile social TV", the company defines itself on its website. "From the moment you wake up to your bedtime, Firework helps you escape banality with immersive and interactive videos, chosen to go with your unique lifestyle."
Video has quickly become the key market for all the giants of the internet, thanks to its format acclaimed by the younger generations.
With its 500 million users claimed last year, TikTok has taken the lead.
The big platforms want to have their social network frequented by pre-teens. Google already has YouTube, acquired 13 years ago and become a must for all ages, with 500 hours of content uploaded to the site every minute according to the giant of research on the internet.
Even Facebook, which already has Instagram, a network focused on the image (photos, videos, gifs), set out to create a competitor to TikTok: Lasso was launched in Mexico, according to remarks by Mark Zuckerberg, the boss of Facebook, at an internal meeting that leaked in the press.
"We'll see if we can make Lasso work in the countries where TikTok does not take up too much space before competing in countries where TikTok is already doing well," Mark Zuckerberg said in July, according to the website. The Verge.
© 2019 AFP