Facebook acquires mega-popular Instagram for a cool Billion

Just days after making its big arrival on the Android platform, popular photo-filtering social network Instagram will be acquired by leading social network Facebook.

The acquisition will give San Francisco-based Instagram approximately $1 billion in cash and shares of Facebook. The deal will close later this quarter.

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the acquisition plans in a Facebook post on Monday.

"We believe these are different experiences that complement each other. But in order to do this well, we need to be mindful about keeping and building on Instagram's strengths and features rather than just trying to integrate everything into Facebook," Zuckerberg said. "That's why we're committed to building and growing Instagram independently. Millions of people around the world love the Instagram app and the brand associated with it, and our goal is to help spread this app and brand to even more people."

Instagram photos are widely shared on social networks besides Facebook, and Zuckerberg said that functionality is not going anywhere.

"We plan on keeping features like the ability to post to other social networks, the ability to not share your Instagrams on Facebook if you want, and the ability to have followers and follow people separately from your friends on Facebook," he said.

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