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Apple reportedly acquiring digital magazine startup Prss
According to TechCrunch, Apple may be acquiring Dutch startup Prss. Prss was founded in 2013 by Jochem Wijnands and Michel Elings of Trvl magazine, which was one of the first iPad newsstand magazines and received accolades in 2010 for its photo-centric design. At Prss, Wijnands and Elings created a web-based tool that allowed users to design iPad-based magazine content for Apple's Newsstand service. The web app used a drag-and-drop interface and supported collaboration, allowing a team to produce a digital magazine without touching a line of code. The acquisition was reported first by Dutch blog iCulture, which noted that several Prss employees from the now closed service, including co-founder Elings, had moved to Palo Alto and the San Francisco Bay area. Apple has not officially announced the acquisition, but when pressed by TechCruch, the company released its usual statement regarding acquisitions. "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and generally we do not discuss our purpose or plans," confirmed the company.
Apple's latest acquisition is a printing press for the iPad
Want to make a digital magazine but Apple's iBook Author app just doesn't offer what you want? Then perhaps Cupertino's latest buy could signal a coming change that'll help you out. The iPhone company has purchased Prss, the digital publishing outfit behind Trvl, which TechCrunch notes was the first iPad-only newsstand publication way back in 2010. Prss' niche is that it allows you to make snazzy-looking iPad mags without needing to know any coding. The news started as an anonymously-sourced report from Dutch iOS blog, iCulture, but Apple confirmed the vowel-averse company's acquisition to TC, stating that it buys smaller tech firms from time to time and "generally do [does] not discuss our [its] plans or purposes." Here's to hoping that this pick-up is a bit less tumultuous than Tim Cook's last purchase. [Image credit: AFP/Getty Images]
