Jim Salter
Legendary programming Q&A website Stack Overflow is being acquired by Prosus N.V., Europe’s largest tech funding agency. Based on a press release on Prosus’ web site, the 2 corporations entered right into a definitive acquisition settlement yesterday.
Based on Amazon Alexa net analytics, Stack Overflow is the forty sixth most closely engaged website on this planet. Since 2008, the positioning has served as the primary cease for builders trying to find solutions to their programming-related questions—and ultimately, their non-programming-related questions, because the Stack Trade community of websites expanded into categories together with tradition, recreation, arts, science, enterprise, and extra.
Prosus will seemingly be a lot much less acquainted, notably to People, because the Amsterdam-listed funding agency has a a lot decrease public profile. Though based mostly in Europe, Prosus invests internationally; for instance, it has the biggest single stake in Chinese language gaming and social media firm Tencent.
In 2001, Prosus’ dad or mum firm Naspers purchased a 46.5% curiosity in Tencent for under $34 million— however earlier this 12 months, Prosus liquidated a 2% Tencent stake for $14.6 billion, retaining a 28.9% curiosity valued at roughly $200 billion. Prosus chairman Koos Bekker stated the Tencent liquidation will “fund continued development in Prosus’ core enterprise traces and rising sectors” and create “some headroom for acquisitions.”
Stack Overflow co-founder Joel Spolsky blogged in regards to the buy, and Stack Overflow CEO Prasanth Chandrasekar wrote a extra official announcement. Each weblog posts characterize the acquisition as having little to no impression on the day-to-day operation of Stack Overflow.
“How you utilize our website and our merchandise is not going to change within the coming weeks or months, simply as our firm’s objectives and strategic priorities stay the identical,” Chandrasekar stated.
Spolsky went into extra element, saying that Stack Overflow will “proceed to function independently, with the very same group in place that has been working it, in response to the very same plan and the very same enterprise practices. Do not count on to see main adjustments or awkward ‘synergies’… all the firm is staying in place: we simply have completely different homeowners now.”
