MySpace To Acquire Social Music iLike

by candice.tsuei | August 19, 2009 at 01:37 pm

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MySpace, the social-networking giant, is going to acquire the popular social music start-up, iLike, in attempt to turn around its struggling business.

While detailed terms of of the deal were not disclosed, it was reported by All Things Digital that that MySpace, a unit of News Corp, has paid iLike $13.5 million in cash upfront, with an additional $6 million to retain founders Ali and Hadi Partovi and other key employees. The whole is is believed to be worth $20 million.

MySpace said iLike Chief Executive Ali Partovi, President Hadi Partovi and Chief Technology Officer Nat Brown will remain with the company. The company said users and music artists "should expect the iLike experience to be unaffected by the acquisition."

Founded in 2006, iLike quickly became one of the most popular widgets on social sites, such as Facebook, where it has also been the top music application with 10 million active monthly users. The iLike service also has a music download offering as well as other features.

Since it is estimated that 80% of iLike's traffic comes from Facebook, it would be interesting to observe how the acquisition will affect iLike's relationship with Facebook, one of MySpace's closest rivals.

In a statement to the BBC Facebook said: "iLike was one of the first applications to be built on Facebook Platform and has become a success with more than 10 million users. "We expect that users will continue to discover and share music through the iLike application on Facebook."

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