Facebook purchases messaging company WhatsApp for $19 billion

The ever-so popular Fortune 500 social networking site, Facebook, has recently agreed to purchase the mobile messaging service, WhatsApp, for a whopping $19 billion in cash and stock. According to the Wall Street Journal’s Reed Albergotti, this purchase presently ranks as the largest-ever purchase of a company that is backed by venture capital. $3 billion in restricted stock units is set to be granted to WhatsApp’s founders and 55 employees over a four-year period.

Facebook’s purchase of the five-year old company WhatsApp comes after its unsuccessful attempt at purchasing another messaging service favorite amongst a younger audience, Snapchat, for approximately $3 billion last year.

With its messaging service usage more than double to 450 million monthly users in the past nine months, WhatsApp has become more popular than Twitter, Inc., which boasts approximately 240 million users and is appraised at $30 billion.

“No one in the history of the world has done anything like that,” said Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, in reference to WhatsApp rising expansion during a conference call.

Facebook’s purchase of WhatsApp will unquestionably strengthen Facebook’s rank in the mobile messaging realm, with its Messenger app placing only second to WhatsApp in the smartphone market.

Check out the photo below to see how Facebook’s purchase of WhatsApp compares to other deals with widely-known brands.

– Antionette Latrese (@_ALatrese)