Facebook buys developer of Jibbigo speech-to-speech translator

Facebook, in a move that could help the social network break down the language barrier among its more than 1 billion users, has acquired Mobile Technologies, a speech recognition and translation company.

Mobile Technologies is the maker of Jibbigo, a smartphone app capable of speech-to-speech translations. The app can perform the translations whether or not it’s connected to the Internet.

“With 6,000 languages in the world, the language divide presents the greatest human communication challenge,” Mobile Technologies said in a post announcing the Facebook acquisition.

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Tom Stocky, Facebook director of product management, announced the news with a status update, calling the purchase “an investment in our long-term product roadmap.”

“Although more than a billion people around the world already use Facebook every month, we are always looking for ways to help connect the rest of the world as well,” Stocky said. “Voice technology has become an increasingly important way for people to navigate mobile devices and the web, and this technology will help us evolve our products to match that evolution.”

Facebook declined to disclose how much it paid for Pittsburgh-based Mobile Technologies.

“Facebook, with its mission to make the world more open and connected, provides the perfect platform to apply our technology at a truly global scale,” Mobile Technologies said.

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