Google Acquisitions Beef Up Google+, Chrome

CEO Larry Page has built a reputation for making quick decisions to help his company compete in various markets. This week, Page decided to bet on two start-ups to help Google compete with Facebook and Firefox.

On Thursday, Google confirmed that it is purchasing Palo Alto social networking firm Katango and San Francisco browser technology startup Apture. Similar to Circles, Katango helps social networkers group contacts.

"Very excited to confirm that we've just acquired Katango!" Google vice president of Products Bradley Horowitz wrote on Google+. "In the earliest days of Google+, I alluded to the fact that we had big plans for Circles. Are you ready for some magic in your Circles? These folks are magicians!"

Happy VCs

Kleiner Perkins took a chance on Katango. The startup was KP's first to benefit from KP's $250 million social media fund. Katango is the brainchild of a group of Stanford PhDs with deep roots in artificial intelligence. They've applied their theoretical learning to create a complex algorithmic solution to a very real problem: organizing and sorting through a flood of contacts and content social networks generate.

"Katango was founded a little over a year ago to develop social algorithms that improve people's online social interaction," the firm wrote in a notice on its web site. "We're excited to join the Google+ team and carry on fulfilling that mission. Google+ is seeing tremendous momentum, so it's a perfect time to join and make Circles smarter for millions of people."

Rob Enderle, principal analyst at The Enderle Group, sees the Katango acquisition as a necessary move for Google. The lack of interest from Google execs and lack of investment into the product has troubled him given what's at stake. Google failed with its Buzz social network offering.

"Google Chairman Eric Schmidt didn't bother to join Google+ until recently. This was...
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