Twitter to buy social TV analytics outfit Bluefin Labs
Twitter is reportedly in the process of acquiring social TV analytics outfit Bluefin Labs, which yesterday ranked the microblogging site as top dog in the Super Bowl's social media arena.
Bluefin Labs, launched in 2011, provides analysis of social media responses to individual TV broadcasts, offering a breakdown of engagement, gender and responses through a service known as Signals.
The company has a client list of 40 US TV networks including Fox, Discovery and NBCUniversal and earlier this year started adding advertising agencies after launching Signals Brands Edition.
The acquisition is thought to be Twitter's largest in dollar terms to date, according to Business Insider, which reports an estimated sale price of between $50m and $100m.
Bluefin raised $12m in VC funding last year, and is reported to have raised a total of $20m to date.
Bluefin may help Twitter reel in advertisers and realise its ambition to boost its revenues from $350m last year to $1bn this year, according to All Things Digital.
Bluefin's analysis of yesterday's Super Bowl found that Twitter dominated the 30.6 million social media comments about commercials featured during breaks.
With the help of a blackout mid-match, it became a record-breaking social TV event, topping last year's election night. Of the total, Twitter users generated 27.7 million "public" comments while Facebook users wrote 2.8 million.