Apple stealthily acquired a British startup in 2013
Earlier this week, news broke that Apple acquired - and immediately closed - an open-source database startup called FoundationDB.
Apple is traditionally extremely secretive about its acquisitions, so it comes as no surprise that the Cupertino company has refused to comment about the deal. Similarly, it stayed mum back in January, when it acquired London-based music technology company Camel Audio.
It is so secretive, in fact, that sometimes these acquisitions are missed entirely. Bloomberg has discovered that FoundationDB isn't Apple's first foray into database tech: It also acquired British data analysis company Acunu back in 2013.
There was no announcement, no disclosure of the financial terms of the deal. Acunu simply quietly closed its doors, with the only evidence of the acquisition found on LinkedIn - with various former Acunu employees updating their LinkedIn profiles to list Apple as their new employer.
Prior to the acquisition, Acunu produced database analytics software that "can work with and improve other tools," according to Bloomberg. Its CEO Tim Moreton is now working as an iCloud manager, according to his LinkedIn profile. And another former Acunu employee now works on the "development of highly distributed systems for structured storage," Apple Insider points out.
Apple acquired FoundationDB in order to double down on its database tech and help manage the vast amounts of data the company has to handle on a daily basis. The 2013 purchase of Acunu suggests that Apple has been working on this challenge for a while.
And the acquisition of Acunu raises another question: If Apple was able to buy a company and have nobody notice for nearly two years, what else has it secretly acquired?