Snapchat, which is now officially called as Snap Inc., has filed for IPO early in this March. The company went public and would now have the capital of the public to lend financial support. However, a report coming from the reputed news organization claims that Google has verbally discussed the acquisition of Snapchat with Snap Inc. CEO Evan Spiegel.
Google held informal talks with Snap Inc. and given an offer of $30 billion in 2016 before Snap's last funding round, and ahead of its IPO this year, according to Business Insider. The said offer was apparently an open secret inside Snap, and was on the table after the IPO, too.
Various reports do suggest that the offer was for $30 billion and the discussions have happened far before the company filed for IPO. Google's offer was still on the table even after Snap Inc. went public. And as expected, Spiegel did not budge, as he did not want to sell out. Actually, only he and Snap Inc. co-founder Bobby Murphy are the ones who can make decisions for the company so public backers have nothing to say about it, even if they wanted to.
However, Google has declined to comment to the Business Insider and Snap told TechCrunch that "these rumors are false." It's speculated by the several publications that Google's curiosity was very preliminary, and possibly never rose to Snap's higher ranks.
Still, Google's relationship with Snapchat remains close. As the Snap, which is one of the Google Cloud's largest customers, has vowed to spend $2 billion on Google Cloud. Cloud is the platform on which Snapchat runs. Together, both the companies could align their Google Glass and Snap Spectacles hardware efforts to build a powerful but appealing AR device. However, there is also a risk when Google's open, engineering-driven culture could clash with Snap's secretive, design-driven culture.
