Microsoft officially acquires GitHub
It is confirmed! Microsoft has indeed acquired GitHub. The acquisition was completed at $7.5 billion in Microsoft stock. The popular Git-based code sharing and collaboration service was valued at 2 billion in 2015. So this deal is far more fruitful to GitHub than it anticipated.
GitHub will get a new face
Former Xamarin CEO Nat Friedman (and now Microsoft corporate vice president) will become GitHub’s CEO. Founder and former CEOChris Wanstrath of GitHub will become a Microsoft technical fellow and work on strategic software initiatives.
“GitHub will retain its developer-first ethos and will operate independently to provide an open platform for all developers in all industries,” a Microsoft spokesperson said.
GitHub believes going for an acquisition was a good move.
Currently it has nearly 28 million developers and 85 million code repositories in its community. It is the largest host of source code globally and is popular among enterprise users, individual developers and open source projects. And used by many big tech companies like Apple, Amazon, Google etc. Yet it has not been immensely profitable. Thus it is speculated that the company decided that an acquisition was preferable over trying to IPO.
Microsoft was always interested in GitHub
Microsoft has struggled to gain developers trust for a long time. Windows Phones have failed and its Universal Windows Apps platform hasn’t taken off. Microsoft has spent recent years improving Windows 10 so it’s a respectable development box. Tools like Visual Studio Code, which lets developers build and debug web and cloud applications, have soared in popularity with developers.
GitHub’s popularity among developers could see Microsoft earn the trust and respect it needs from developers. As Microsoft is already trusted across many software and services, GItHubs association strengthens it even further.
Microsoft clearly needs to treat this acquisition with care.
“Microsoft is a developer-first company, and by joining forces with GitHub we strengthen our commitment to developer freedom, openness and innovation,” said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella . She believes in empowering every developer to build, innovate and solve the world’s most pressing challenges.
