Google has acquired the Seattle-based natural language processing startup company, Wavii in a $30m deal.
Prior to Google, Apple expressed interest to acquire Wavii to incorporate the startup’s aggregation technology and natural summarisation algorithms into its Siri voice-activated personal assistant feature.
Following the acquisition, the 25-person- team, including founder Adrian Aoun, will be relocated from Seattle to Google’s Knowledge Graph unit that includes web search team from Page and Co.
The start-up’s language detection technology is anticipated to strengthen Google’s Knowledge Graph by offering users with improved results and direct answers for their queries.
Additionally, as the language recognition permeates Page and Co.’s projects, Google Now and Google Glass would be potential beneficiary of the acquisition.
The start-up was found by Paypal co-founder Max Levchin, former Facebook executive Dave Morin, and Fritz Lanman, a former dealmaker at Microsoft.
Google’s purchase follows Yahoo’s acquisition of UK based start-up Summly, the news reader and rival to Wavii founded by Nick D’Aloisio.
