Nokia Buys Dopplr: The Ovi-Based Foursquare?
Social networking travel site Dopplr has apparently been acquired by Nokia for somewhere between $15-22 million dollars. A year ago ReadWriteWeb named Dopplr one of the Top 10 International Products of 2008 and it looks like the community's social features have garnered significant interest from investors. According to TechCrunch, just as the company was about to close an additional funding round, Nokia moved in for the acquisition.
In 2008, Nokia purchased Plazes - another location-based service with social networking roots. Plazes offers users the opportunity to share locations and activities with friends while geotagging the sites they like. Dopplr serves a similar purpose; however, friends are meant to meet up while traveling.
This has had significant success amongst business travelers who are looking for a familiar face in new surroundings. Nevertheless, the company also offers an iPhone Social Atlas service where users add reviews and tips to their favorite destinations. If this sounds familiar it's because services like Foursquare and most recently Gowalla have gotten iPhone users into the habit of checking in and leaving tips at their favorite haunts and watering holes.
Perhaps the latest Dopplr acquisition is just Nokia's effort to beef up the Plazes team and create the Ovi App Store version of an already growing trend towards location-based games and reviews.
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What's that map in Dopplr iPhone app? It's not from Google Maps API. Did the company make it by itself? I would use Dopplr because I like the map, it looks so beautiful!
I don't think Nokia strategically acquired Dopplr before it closed a round of funding. This story sounds familiar, similar to something i was involved with... like it failed at getting its next round of funding and sold the assets to Nokia so the CEO could get his old job back
Congrats to the team, wonderful news and well deserved. They are a hugely respected and liked UK company, nice to see another success.
Nokia is clueless ?
@cncdcc: It's an Open Street Map with a custom Cloudmade style
After they bought Plazes the service went down. Will the same thing happen with Dopplr?
@Dan W: Thank you very much.