June the 6th, 2023 – The most significant startup acquisition in Croatian history has now been completed – Photomath, headed by serial entrepreneur Damir Sabol, has been sold to Google.
As Bernard Ivezic/Novac/Jutarnji writes, after a long process, Google has now entirely completed the takeover of Photomath. Several different sources have now confirmed that the largest startup acquisition in Croatia so far, with an estimated value of up to 550 million US dollars, is now done. As is currently unofficially known, no single regulator in the world has found a reason to stop this transaction from going through.
The European Commission gave a thumbs up
The European Commission was the first to give the green light for Photomath’s exit. Back at the end of March, it announced that it saw no reason as to why the most popular Croatian app couldn’t be sold to Google.
The European Commission, in accordance with the EU Merger Regulation, unconditionally approved the acquisition of Photomath by Google, concluding that this transaction wouldn’t threaten market competition in the European Economic Area.
Although at the time it was thought that this was enough for the acquisition to be concluded, it wasn’t the case. Google, as part of Alphabet, one of the largest companies in the world, has global plans going forward with Photomath, so it had to go through numerous regulatory processes. Because of this, Photomath abstained from making any public appearances and didn’t make any official statements about the acquisition for the last two months.
Regulatory obstacles have been tackled?
At this moment in time, as various sources claim, all these potential regulatory obstacles have been overcome, but there has still been no answer to any journalistic inquiries sent to Google or Photomath. Their comment is not only important because of the announcement of the acquisition, but also because in the last few months people have started talking about different scenarios, what kind of plans Google has with Photomath in Zagreb, as well as what the full value of the acquisition is. So far there are only guesses and estimates about this circulating around various media spaces.
It is known that by taking over Photomath, Google will get its first R&D centre in Croatia, precisely in the area that is at the peak of hype – artificial intelligence (AI).
What makes Photomath so different?
Photomath is otherwise a mobile app that solves maths problems by taking pictures. In this field, it is the most successful such app in the world, both in terms of speed and the quality of the results it delivers, as well as in terms of the number of users it boasts. Photomath has been downloaded more than 350 million times so far.
To be able to solve mathematical problems by taking pictures, Photomath uses AI on several levels. First to recognise the text, then to solve the problems and then to interpret the results. As such, Photomath is also the most popular Croatian AI product to date.
Why did Google want Photomath so much?
While there has been much speculation as to why exactly Google bought Photomath, the key reason was revealed by ChatGPT itself, the most popular AI product in the world at the moment. ChatGPT is pretty good at forming text and writing computer code, but when it comes to maths, it has a tendency to get stuck.
Google has its own version of ChatGPT called Bard, and it has a similar problem. However, Photomath is an AI that is focused on mathematics, so in the global battle between ChatGPT, whose side is OpenAI and Microsoft, and Bard, whose side is Google, it’s the latter that will now gain the upper hand.
The Google search engine or Google Search is the most visited site on the Internet. It processes more than 3.5 billion queries daily and holds 92 percent of the world’s search market, and analysts see ChatGPT as the main threat to that Google business.
Photomath is available on both Androids and iPhones
For many years now, this remarkable Croatian application has been the most requested mobile application to help with learning mathematics across the pond in the USA, and it has this status globally.
Damir Sabol, the founder of Photomath, recently revealed that the Croatian startup has so far received 40 million US dollars in investments from various American investors. This list of investors includes Cherubic Ventures, Goodwater Capital, GSV Ventures, Menlo Ventures and Learn Capital.
Sabol also announced that almost all Photomath employees are also co-owners of the startup, so almost everyone will benefit from being sold to Google.
