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Google Acquires Design Prototyping Tool Maker Pixate

Google Acquires Design Prototyping Tool Maker Pixate

By Manish Singh | Updated: 4 August 2015 14:44 IST

Google has acquired Pixate, a Palo Alto-based startup that develops mobile apps prototyping tool. As part of the deal, employees of Pixate will join Google's design team.

Pixate's flagship tool allows app developers to create visual prototypes for Android and iOS, among other platforms. It also has a desktop client, which works seamlessly with cloud services. Among its clients include thousands of employees of top companies like Apple, Microsoft, and Facebook.

Pixate says that its app will continue to exist as a standalone product without any interruption. It assures that users can continue to prototype apps for iOS as well Also, it is still accepting new sign-ups.

The company is also making a basic version of its service available for free. The version of the app that lets teams collaborate, however, will continue to be paid at $5 per user every month, or $50 per user for an entire year.

The company has its origins in Y-Combinator, a massively popular American seed fund. It raised $3.8 million in Series A financing from Accel Partners in 2013."We don't want to stop there. Our small team at Pixate has some really big ideas, and with the help of Google we'll be able to bring those ideas to the design community at scale," said Paul Colton, CEO for Pixate.

"We've become an essential part of the workflow for tens of thousands of designers, and are excited about expanding our mission at Google to reach millions of product teams worldwide."

The acquisition shows Google's growing interest in refining and making advances to its development processes. Pixate's acquisition is the second major step the company has made in this front.

Last year, it acquired Relative Wave. Relative Wave uses Visual Programming language in the backend for the development of prototype apps. Interestingly, its platform, known as Form, was updated to version 1.3 to bring more Material Design improvements at the sidelines of the acquisition announcement.

Using Pixate's tools, the Android maker will likely work on a new design aesthetic to unify look and feel across its products and services.

Neither company shared financial details of the deal.

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