Twitter has acquired London-based Magic Pony to enhance its machine learning capabilities in image processing, the company said in a statement today. A TechCrunch report pegged the size of the deal at $150 million. Magic Pony’s team will join Twitter’s team of engineers, data scientists, and machine learning researchers who build and test “new experiences (for users) to share and participate in.” Note that this is Twitter’s third acquisition in a machine learning company: In June last year it acquired Artificial Intelligence (AI) focused company Whetlab for an undisclosed amount, in July 2014 it acquired image search startup Madbits for an undisclosed amount. Twitter said that Magic Pony’s technology, which creates algorithms in visual or image processing, will be used to enhance its live video product Periscope, short clips product Vine and other video and image based features. Magic Pony will broadly focus on computer vision, machine learning, high-performance computing, and computational neuroscience. Twitter could be working on new live streaming products: The company’s recent addition to machine learning came after its CFO Anthony Noto hinted on plans of launching a live scorecard or match information feature, and plans of offering other “live premium content”, in a recent conference call. This could be something like Facebook’s Sports Stadium feature that aggregates posts, comments, live scores, stats, etc in single page. Twitter also said that it would monetize on Periscope and Vine by bringing them to the Twitter timeline, and allowing marketers to run ads. SoundCloud acquisition: Last week, Twitter acquired…
