US-based app discovery platform Quixey has acquired Dexetra, the company behind Iris (an Android clone of Siri), and Friday, an application which tracks an individuals usage of the mobile phone, reports NextBigWhat. While we are yet to receive a response from the company, our sources have confirmed this acquisition. The rumors of Dexetra acquisition has been doing the rounds for quite some time now. Earlier, a source-based The Economic Times report had mentioned that NewsHunt owner Ver Se Innovation had acquired Dexetra in a cash and stock deal. Interestingly, its worth noting that Dexetra had shifted its 17 member team to San Francisco in February last year, after raising over $1 million investment from Sequoia Capital and Qualcomm Ventures. Post this investment, the company had stated plans of integrating Friday with Qualcomm’s AllJoyn. Prior to this investment, One97 Mobility Fund had invested an undisclosed amount of money in Dexetra in November 2010. This appears to be an acqui-hire deal, with the Dexetra team and its suite of products expected to become a part of Quixey. The report also mentions that this acquisition is part of Quixey's plan to open an development center in India. Quixey was founded in 2009 and had raised $50 million from Alibaba Group and other investors like GGV Capital Innovation Endeavors, TransLink Capital and U.S. Venture Partners in October last year. Last month, Quixey had also signed a partnership with Alibaba to be the exclusive app-related search provider on Alibaba's YunOS.
