EBay on Wednesday announced that it has bought Critical Path Software, a mobile application developer, in the latest move to strengthen its position in the rapidly growing field of mobile commerce.
Critical Path, based in Portland, the U.S. state of Oregon, was one of the first developers to create mobile applications for iPhone and smartphones running other mobile operating systems.
Critical Path has worked with eBay for more than two years to deliver different eBay applications for iPhone.
EBay launched its first application for the iPhone in July 2008, and its core free iPhone application has been downloaded more than 14 million times so far.
According to numbers released by eBay, value of all goods sold through mobile commerce at eBay totaled more than 600 million U.S. dollars in 2009, and is expected to jump to 1.5 billion dollars this year.
"We're very serious about innovating in mobile commerce, and this acquisition underscores our commitment to bringing the very best and brightest in the field to eBay," Mark Carges, senior vice president of eBay's marketplaces division, said in a statement.
Terms of the purchase agreement were not disclosed.
