[Update 6:45pm PST: Apple has confirmed the acquisition. The company tells us "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."]
TechCrunch has learned that Apple (AAPL) has made another acquisition, one that it is using to boost its e-books effort and “beat Amazon at its own game.” It has bought BookLamp, a startup based out of Boise, Idaho, that developed big data-style book analytics services.
A second source says Apple bought BookLamp’s employees and technology for a price that was “higher than $10 million, and lower than $15 million.”
BookLamp’s most well-known product was the Book Genome Project, a platform that let users find suggestions for books to read based on natural language analysis of other titles. BookLamp’s tech and talent could help Apple improve its iBooks service with better recommendations, search, and categorization.
TechCrunch has reached out to Apple for confirmation on the deal with BookLamp, as well as to BookLamp’s CEO Aaron Stanton and several former employees including Matt Monroe, and Dan Bowen. Stanton said “Sorry, Josh. I can’t help you”, which meshes with the strict gag order Apple places on companies it buys. But in the meantime while we wait for an official response from Apple, here’s some more evidence we’ve amassed.
The Former BookLamps team (from left): Matt Monroe, Sidian Jones, Aaron Stanton, and Dan Bowen
We first heard of the sale via an anonymous tip (thank you, anonymous reader). Digging around, we found that several employees appear to have decamped from Idaho to the Cupertino, California-area where Apple is headquartered.
Prior to the exit, BookLamp had raised around $900,000 from local backers. Yes, it looks like BookLamp is Apple’s first acquisition out of Idaho. And it turns out BookLamp had also been in talks with Amazon at one point, but how far they went is not clear. Amazon ultimately went on to acquire GoodReads, another competitor in the book recommendation space, and Apple bought BookLamp.
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