(Bloomberg) --Google said it plans to acquire Xively, a unit of LogMeIn Inc., in a bid to capture sales from businesses that manage a growing number of devices connected to the internet.
The internet giant agreed to pay $50 million for the business, which generated $3 million in revenue during the most recent quarter, LogMeIn said Thursday on a conference call. The deal is expected to close in the first quarter and 45 Xively employees are joining Google.
Alphabet Inc.’s Google has made a series of small acquisitions for its cloud unit, a rival to market leaders Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. Xively sells software for managing Internet-of-Things devices such as smoke alarms and water heaters. That may help Google score new corporate customers like large manufacturers that rely on connected hardware and sensors.
Earlier this week, Injong Rhee, a top Samsung Electronics Co. executive, said he was moving to Google to work on Internet-of-Things services for its cloud business. On Google’s last earnings call, the search company said its cloud unit is now generating $4 billion in annual sales. That includes cloud storage, computing power and software applications for companies.
