Google to buy data company Looker in $2.6bn deal

Google has agreed to buy business intelligence, data applications and embedded analytics platform Looker in a $2.6bn cash deal.

Parent company Alphabet said on Thursday that Looker will join Google Cloud.

Google Cloud's chief executive officer, Thomas Kurian, said: "Google Cloud is being used by many of the leading organisations in the world for analytics and decision-making. The combination of Google Cloud and Looker will enable customers to harness data in new ways to drive their digital transformation.

"We remain committed to our multi-cloud strategy and will retain and expand Looker’s capabilities to analyse data across Clouds."

The acquisition builds on an existing partnership where the two companies share more than 350 joint customers, such as Buzzfeed, WPP Essence and Yahoo!.

Looker's chief executive, Frank Bien, said the combination advances the company's mission "to empower humans through the smarter use of data".

"Now, we’ll have greater reach, more resources, and the brightest minds in both analytics and cloud infrastructure working together to build an exciting path forward for our customers and partners. Together, we are reinventing what it means to solve business problems with data at an entirely different scale and value point."