Amazon- Twitch enters into largest ever USD 1.1b acquisition deal

Online retailer giant Amazon.com has struck a biggest acquisition deal ever with Twitch Interactive Inc. to buy its video services for more than USD 1 billion.

According to the sources, Amazon decided to move into the deal to buy the online gathering place for video game enthusiasts in the aftermath of the failure of its similar deal with Google.

The highly placed sources said Amazon is paying USD 970 million in cash to Twitch and the total transaction is worth about USD 1.1 billion including retention-related payouts.

This will be the biggest deal in the 20-year history of Amazon. It will give Amazon an online forum where more than 55 million monthly active users will discuss games, share their innovations and watch other gamers playing.

‘‘Broadcasting and watching gameplay is a global phenomenon and Twitch has built a platform that brings together tens of millions of people who watch billions of minutes of games each month,’’ Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s chief executive, said in a statement.

Bezos is currently focusing on the popularity of video games to enhance its entertainment services and derive maximum benefits for the company.

If the company insiders are to be believed, Amazon is currently operating a game studio in Seattle and has also asked the software developers to build more video game titles for its Kindle Fire tablets, Fire TV set-top box and Fire Phone.

Market watchers say the largest deal also points out the cut-throat competition between Amazon and Google. The two leading companies in the tech world have been competing each other in all walks of web, including Internet advertising and online data storage.

It is worth mentioning, search giant Google and Twitch were earlier in talks on a transaction that could value video service provider at about USD 1 billion, a reliable source familiar to the matter said in May.