Amazon has signed a deal to acquire Ring, a California-based builder of smart doorbells, security cameras and related gadgets.
The acquisition is the latest sign of Amazon’s ambition to be a major player in the realm of internet-connected home devices.
The company last year launched Amazon Key, a service that uses an Amazon-built security camera and smart locks built by other companies to grant access to the home for scheduled deliveries and other services. Its Alexa voice-activated digital assistant, meanwhile, has emerged as one of the leading software tools linking together internet connected devices, from light bulbs to refrigerators, built by other companies.
An Amazon spokesman confirmed the Ring acquisition, which was reported earlier by GeekWire, but declined to comment on the deal’s terms. Bloomberg reported the price of the transaction is about $1 billion.
That would rank Ring among Amazon’s biggest acquisitions. The company paid $1.2 billion for online shoe retailer Zappos in 2009, and the 2014 acquisition of video-game streaming service Twitch penciled out to about $840 million, though initial reporting had that figure closer to $1 billion. (Amazon’s only multibillion-dollar acquisition was the $13.5 billion purchase of Whole Foods Market, which was sealed in August.)
Ring, founded in 2012, has raised more than $400 million in debt and equity sales, according to PitchBook data. Its most recent outside investment round, in October, raised $160 million and valued the company at $760 million.
Amazon’s Alexa Fund was among the company’s backers.
The Santa Monica, Calif., company is the second connected home security startup that Amazon acquired recently. The company in December acquired Blink, a Massachusetts-based maker of doorbells and cameras.
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