The tech company Facebook’s crypto division reported their first acquisition. They have boarded a research team from a startup that specialises in smart contract development.

Facebook is deep into the blockchain

Many tech companies have started to look into cryptocurrencies and blockchain. Facebook, started around nine months ago when they launched a blockchain division. The head of the Messenger app David Marcus left his role to supervise and lead the new team at the company. A few months back, the company’s director of Engineer, Evan Chang, joined the division. During one point, there were even rumours that they would acquire Coinbase

The company initially banned all adds regarding cryptocurrencies on Facebook but reversed it about six months later, and now they need to approve the advertisers. Even though they move carefully, they have over two billion users. It could have a huge effect if they chose to integrate blockchain and cryptocurrencies in their company.

The most recent story that makes rounds on the internet is that Facebook has acquired a blockchain startup, Chainspace. Chainspace is a blockchain firm founded by University College London researchers.

Facebook hires blockchain researchers

The company has made its first acquisition in the blockchain space. The social network hired the team behind Chainspace. The acquisition of Chainspace’s team is the clearest sign yet of Facebook’s ambition to be a big player in the nascent blockchain industry.

The Chainspace website describes its project as a scale smart contracts platform that uses a distributed web of blockchains for scalability, speed and privacy. It means that one of Chainspace’s goals was to improve the speed of transactions through blockchain technology. The reason being that the current functions move much slower than traditional financial institutions like Visa. The researchers behind Chainspace were also looking at how blockchain and decentralisation could be applied to areas outside of payments, like polling.

Two of the white paper authors, Alberto Sonnino and George Danezis, already list their employment as blockchain researchers in Facebook’s London office on LinkedIn. However, the social network isn’t acquiring any of Chainspace’s technology, according to the spokesperson.

“Like many other companies, Facebook is exploring ways to leverage the power of blockchain technology. This new small team is exploring many different applications. We don’t have anything further to share.”

However, Facebook is not the only tech company that is involved in the new industry. Square Inc recently surpassed Coinbase as the top bitcoin buying application. Alibaba group and IBM leads the way when it comes to blockchain patents by filing for around 100 each.

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