Google too wanted to buy Github before Microsoft snatched it up

Microsoft may have acquired Github this past week, but the firm wasn’t the only suitor for its affections in recent time. A new report from CNBC indicates that Alphabet Inc’s Google was also talking to Github in hopes of an acquisition.

Details of the Google negotiation have not yet been made public, but it according to the report, it wasn’t a close auction, meaning Microsoft paid significantly enough for Github that Google could not hope to match it.

Github makes sense as an acquisition target for both Google and Microsoft. The former runs one of the largest open source projects in the world with Android and AOSP, the latter has delved more into open source this pas few years since the ascension of Satya Nadella into CEO position.

Microsoft has worked on making Windows more open source, including integrating support for Linux — one of the preferred operating systems of techies directly into Windows.

Microsoft purchased Github for $7.5 billion this week and expects the acquisition to get closed by the end of the calendar year.

“Microsoft is a developer-first company, and by joining forces with GitHub we strengthen our commitment to developer freedom, openness and innovation,” said Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft. “We recognize the community responsibility we take on with this agreement and will do our best work to empower every developer to build, innovate and solve the world’s most pressing challenges.”

“I’m extremely proud of what GitHub and our community have accomplished over the past decade, and I can’t wait to see what lies ahead. The future of software development is bright, and I’m thrilled to be joining forces with Microsoft to help make it a reality,” Github’s CEO Wanstrath said. “Their focus on developers lines up perfectly with our own, and their scale, tools and global cloud will play a huge role in making GitHub even more valuable for developers everywhere.”

Source: CNBC