Facebook acquires Face.com, brings facial recognition technology in-house

It’s been rumored for quite some time, and now it’s official: Facebook has swooped in and purchased Face.com. The company’s facial-recognition technology is already used to offer auto-tag suggestions when users upload photos to Facebook, and now the social network owns every bit of it. In a statement to AllThingsD, Facebook said that “this transaction simply brings a world-class team and a long-time technology vendor in house.” It’s believed that the move (in addition to its acquisition of Instagram for $1 billion in April) is Facebook’s attempt to strengthen its mobile offerings. No official word on how much the company (and its desirable domain) cost Facebook, but “multiple sources” tell TechCrunch that it’s about $100 million. The deal is expected to close “in the coming weeks.”

Fortunately, it sounds like developers who rely on Face.com’s APIs won’t be left in the cold quite yet. In a post on the company’s official blog, it says that “the plan is to continue to support our developer community.” We’re still waiting to hear more on what Facebook’s plans are for Face.com, but for its part the facial-recognition company says: “By working with Facebook directly, and joining their team, we’ll have more opportunities to build amazing products that will be employed by consumers - that’s all we’ve ever wanted to do.”