Facebook to buy Giphy, keep its branding, integrate with Instagram; sources say the deal is worth ~$400M, while Giphy was valued at ~$600M in its latest round

Facebook has agreed to buy Giphy, the popular platform of sharable animated images, Axios has learned from multiple sources.

Axios 2020-05-15

Context & Ripple Effects

Facebook's agreement to buy Giphy closes a fast process: investor and board member John Borthwick says talks began in late March, and the reported ~$400M price lands below the ~$600M valuation from Giphy's latest funding round. Facebook keeps Giphy's branding and plans to integrate it with Instagram.

The strategic logic goes beyond stickers: reporting the next day showed that owning Giphy gives Facebook visibility into how and where gifs are shared outside its own apps, including device IDs and keystrokes captured in Giphy tools — a data asset layered onto a distribution one.

First-order effects

Giphy's embedding business now sits inside Facebook: every third-party app using Giphy's library and keyboard tools hands usage telemetry — including device IDs and keystroke data — to a Facebook-owned company.

Second-order effects

Apps and platforms that treat Giphy as neutral shared infrastructure must weigh whether to keep embedding a direct competitor's tooling, or shift to alternatives — the same gatekeeper-leverage question that later drew the UK CMA into a formal investigation over competition in video clips and animated images.

Third-order effects

This deal became the template case for regulators treating platform acquisitions of shared content infrastructure as competition problems: the UK CMA ultimately blocked Meta's ownership, forcing a sale to Shutterstock for $53M — an 87% markdown on the reported ~$400M price that repriced regulatory risk into every future platform acquisition.

The trend: Big-platform tuck-in acquisitions of widely embedded content layers are shifting from quiet consolidation to contested deals where antitrust review, not price, determines who ends up owning the asset.

Discussion

@facebook @facebook on x
Welcome to the family, @GIPHY! https://about.fb.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@giphy @giphy on x
We're so excited to share some news - GIPHY has been acquired by @Facebook and is joining the @Instagram team! 🎉 Read more here: https://medium.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@mathewi Mathew Ingram on x
At $400 million, Facebook's Giphy acquisition is just a hair behind the largest media acquisition of the last decade or so, Axel Springer's purchase of Business Insider in 2015 https://twitter.com/...
@williamturton William Turton on x
My first thought: there is now a Facebook product built into Signal https://www.axios.com/...
@dhof Dom Hofmann on x
since this is more important now, a reminder that giphy's client SDK requires developers to give access to the device tracking ID
@can @can on x
Does this mean the gifs embedded in our IMs are also now Facebook tracking beacons? Is this why Facebook bought them? https://twitter.com/...
@stephcd Steph Davidson on x
The difference between giphy and napster is that metallica have lawyers
@jonrussell Jon Russell on x
I remember when Giphy was valued at $600M (!) and not even focused on monetisation. Always seemed like a tough jump into branded GIFs or sponsored search results: guess Facebook will ram that home now https://techcrunch.com/...
@chronotope Aram Zucker-Scharff on x
Gif directories are of no intrinsic monetary value except by providing additional value to other services; withdrawing that value from those other services; or using the download process to track you across the web. Have fun watching that integration.
@counternotions Kontra on x
1997: Apple buys NeXT for about $400M 2020: Facebook buys Giphy for about $400M (I wonder which is the better value) ↓ https://twitter.com/...
@jonfortt Jon Fortt on x
My take: Facebook buying Giphy is less about engagement and more about data. Think about it: Even if FB can't see the private messages you're sending, if they can see the GIFs you're searching for, they get a clue about how you're thinking & feeling. https://www.cnbc.com/...
@moonalice Roger McNamee on x
Attention, FTC, DOJ and Congress: you should stop this acquisition. Immediately. In fact, you should prohibit internet giants from making acquisitions of any kind. Monopolization of tech is bad for the economy, employment, and civil rights. https://twitter.com/...
@gymshortsstuds GSS on x
The evil empire grows! https://twitter.com/...
@sivavaid Siva Vaidhyanathan on x
Should be blocked. Won't be blocked. Because antitrust is a fantasy. https://twitter.com/...
@sbisson @sbisson on x
Time to disconnect Giphy from enterprise social tools like Teams and Slack. Your corporate chat streams are going to be full of Facebook tracking beacons if you don't...
@joshelman Josh Elman on x
In related news - I do like the value placed here on expression and I like to see the @GIPHY team rewarded for all the work they did on helping invent this category. Congrats https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@joshconstine @joshconstine on x
For $400M, Facebook just bought GIPHY's surveillance into visual communication trends in every app. https://twitter.com/...
@cycle_soosai @cycle_soosai on x
Facebook stretegy seems to be chasing users who have run away by buying services that are built into other apps they use. Bleddy fellows. Won't leave anyone alone on this planet https://twitter.com/...
@brosandprose Ella Dawson on x
If Zuck ruins @GIPHY, I swear to GOD I will riot in the streets. https://www.cnbc.com/...
@wongmjane Jane Manchun Wong on x
Giphy from Instagram from ＦＡＣＥＢＯＯＫ https://www.cnbc.com/...
@taylorlorenz Taylor Lorenz on x
The deal was valued around $300M with a little more for employee retention, a roughly 50% drop from Giphy's last known valuation of $600 million in 2016. @alexeheath and @KateClarkTweets with the scoop! https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
@arctictony Tony Haile on x
All FB $ investments in journalism should now be measured in units based on giphy's $400m acquisition. ie. “FB announced they were investing 25% of a giphy to support journalism today” https://www.axios.com/...
@jeremysliew @jeremysliew on x
Congratulations to @instagram for acquiring @giphy! Two cornerstones of pop culture coming together. https://about.fb.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@xor Parker Higgins on x
Given Facebook's GIPHY acquisition, Signal's highly engineered privacy preservation for something “frivolous” like gif search seems pretty prescient https://signal.org/... https://twitter.com/...
@sarahfrier Sarah Frier on x
Giphy will keep all its existing integrations with other apps like Twitter, which means Facebook gets the data on those API calls, which will give the company insight into what people are using beyond Facebook.
@caseynewton Casey Newton on x
I think the best way to see this deal is through the lens of Facebook's opportunism during the pandemic https://twitter.com/...
@stevekovach Steve Kovach on x
Does anyone know if Apple uses Giphy for iMessage GIFs? Unclear where Apple sources that library from.
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Section VII: Intellectual Property Risks and Mitigations https://twitter.com/...
@mattlynley Matthew Lynley on x
They wanted to raise as much as $100m in early 2018 https://techcrunch.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@jason_kint @jason_kint on x
Giphy CEO Alex Chung: 'We're gonna make a ton of money' - October 21, 2015 @mollywood https://www.marketplace.org/ ...
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Facebook just bought the world's largest archive of DMCA takedown requests. The due diligence memo must have been awesome. https://twitter.com/...
@mattlynley Matthew Lynley on x
Facebook is in your keyboard now lol https://twitter.com/...
@alexrkonrad Alex Konrad on x
Giphy was valued at $600M in 2016, and there were reports it was close to a big funding round in 2018 that I don't think materialized. Its rival Tenor was gobbled up by Google that year. Any gif startups left that Twitter can buy next? https://twitter.com/...
@taylorlorenz Taylor Lorenz on x
Facebook bought Giphy. Giphy is going to move and work out of the IG offices in NYC. https://www.cnbc.com/...
@rustybrick Barry Schwartz on x
$400M for a GIF site https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@tuviae Tuvia Elbaum on x
$400m sounds crazy for an app that makes gifs? They were valued north of $600m... https://techcrunch.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@wyldkard @wyldkard on x
Oh great, another service that will now track us. Thanks a lot, Facebook users. https://twitter.com/...
@dannyjpalmer Danny Palmer on x
Everyone: Facebook, please do something about all the fake news, conspiracy theories and other things having a negative impact on the world. Facebook: We're spending $400m on Giphy. https://twitter.com/...
@tonyromm Tony Romm on x
okay i can officially now say that my struggle to describe a gif in the lede of the post officially qualifies me as an Old
@bdsams Brad Sams on x
Introducing: Giphy by Facebook Giphy for Work Giphy for Gram https://twitter.com/...
@daithaigilbert David Gilbert on x
Facebook this week pledged to pay thousands of its moderators who suffered PTSD a total of $52M. To give you a sense of how insignificant that amount of money is to FB, today it's paying $400M for Giphy https://www.axios.com/...
@shaig Shai Goldman on x
NYC based Giphy, being acquired by Facebook for $400M per @axios . That is a good deal for Facebook. Initial funding came from RRE, Lerer Hippeau, Betaworks, CAA. https://www.axios.com/...
@backlon Dieter Bohn on x
I guess that's one way for Facebook to finally be good at “video” 😐 https://www.axios.com/...
@hunterwalk @hunterwalk on x
@danprimack the lack of gifs in this post is ironic https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@tomwarren Tom Warren on x
Giphy was good while it lasted https://twitter.com/...

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