At this very moment Apple is rumored to be involved in active talks to buy Dr. Dre’s Beats Electronics. At over 3 billion dollars, this would be Apple’s biggest acquisition ever, far surpassing the $429 million Apple spent in 1996 to buy NeXT, its largest purchase to date.
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As first reported by the Financial Times, and since backed up by the likes of the Washington Post, CNBC, and Reuters, this acquisition would put Apple at the helm of one of the most popular premium headphone brands in the country. But it's not just a headphone company that’s included in the deal, it's also the recently launched Beats Music, which has seen remarkable early success as a worthy competitor to the likes of Pandora, Spotify, and of course iTunes Radio.
If this deal does go down Apple stands to benefit greatly from both the high-end headphone brand's stellar products as well as the consolidation of iTunes Radio and Beats’ subscription-only music streaming service. Purchasing Beats is also a shrewd business move in that it will be a significant boost to Apple's "cool-factor," as Beats are not only immensely popular and posh, but the brand speaks to a younger generation who have already embraced it and identify with it.
Hot on the heels of this latest rumor comes further word from the New York Post that Beats co-founder and CEO, music mogul Jimmy Iovine is actually in talks with Apple to join the company as "special advisor" to Tim Cook on creative matters. If you’re an Apple fan, you may even recall that prior to Steve Jobs’ passing he and Iovine were in talks about collaborating on a subscription-based music service; so in some ways this doesn't come as a huge surprise, even though news of this possible merger has taken the Internet by storm. With Iovine’s substantial contacts in the music industry, his joining the team would theoretically give Apple substantial leverage in future negotiations with record labels, among other benefits.
Stay tuned to iPhone Life and we'll keep you updated on all the details of this pending mega-merger.
