Google to Buy Meebo Chat Service

Google is purchasing chat service Meebo.

From a Monday post on the Meebo blog announcing the deal:

For more than seven years we've been helping publishers find deeper relationships with their users and to make their sites more social and engaging. Together with Google, we're super jazzed to roll up our sleeves and get cracking on even bigger and better ways to help users and website owners alike.

A Google rep was not immediately available for comment. However, The Next Web reports that Meebo team members who join the web giant will be folded into the Google+ team.

Sources told AllThingD in May that Google was considering purchasing Meebo for $100 million.

Founded in 2005, Meebo offers products like the Meebo Bar — which can be embedded onto third-party websites, letting users connect without leaving the site — and Meebo Messenger — which lets users of Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, AIM and others chat over a single service. At the end of April 2012, a Quantcast report said more than 62.7 million people in the United States used the service on a monthly basis.

UPDATE 1: A Google spokesperson has responded with the following statement, confirming the Meebo team's future with Google+. From our email with the rep:

We are always looking for better ways to help users share content and connect with others across the web, just as they do in real life. With the Meebo team’s expertise in social publisher tools, we believe they will be a great fit with the Google+ team. We look forward to closing the transaction and working with the Meebo team to create more ways for users to engage online.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

UPDATE 2: TechCrunch is reporting that Meebo might announce layoffs in the near future.