Apple has shut down the Twitter analytics company Topsy two years after it was acquired. On Twitter, the company tweeted that it has “searched [its] last tweet”.
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We reported on Apple’s acquisition of Topsy for around £122 million on December 3, 2013, making it one of Apple’s more expensive purchases.
Topsy’s Twitter bio now reads: “Every tweet ever published”.
It looked like Topsy would close previous year, when premium Topsy users were prevented from renewing their subscriptions. According to commentators, Topsy’s analytics might come in handy for services like the iTunes media store, Siri, or iAd advertising platform.
Its technology is also likely to prove useful in helping Apple develop backend features in iOS 9 such as Siri Suggestions which integrates geolocation data with data providers such as Yelp! to surface nearby places of interest.
Twitter user Adrian Parker (@adrianparker) tweeted: “Heartbreak”. Founded in 2008, Topsy offered a real-time search engine, which indexed and ranked search results based on the most influential social media conversations about each specific term, topic, page or domain queried.
“RIP (rest in peace) Topsy” Rishab Aiyer Ghosh, one of the four founders of the company, tweeted Tuesday night.
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Apple never said why it bought the company, although it’s clear the move wasn’t an effort launch a new social network service.
