A recent report from Digital Trends claims that Google is in talks to acquire WhatsApp, and the parties have been communicating for 4 or 5 weeks now. The source that Digital Trends has been speaking to said that WhatsApp has been “playing hardball” and managed to up the acquisition price to nearly $1 billion.

On today’s SiliconAngle morning NewsDesk show with Kristin Feledy, contributing editor John Casaretto provides his breaking analysis on the pending deal:

“It seems like the market is set by this whole Instagram purchase a year ago by Facebook, that seems kinda be like the role they were playing.  WhatsApp has this estimated revenue of about a hundred million dollars a year. It’s from the outside looking in but it is a huge app, it’s the number one paid app in more than a hundred countries that have huge user base ..

“It also has a bunch of alliances, some revenue that it generates through some partnerships with international telecommunications companies.”

Whether or not WhatsApp deserves the alleged price is still disputable. This story may end like Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram last year, which turned out to be a bit disadvantageous for the social media giant. WhatsApp doesn’t even have as much computer data as Instagram when it was acquired by Facebook, and that makes the assessment a bit overboard.

Nevertheless, WhatsApp is a really popular messaging application, with a record-setting 7 billion inbound messages and 11 billion outbound messages during New Year’s Eve. Preceding the one-day record was a total of 10 billion inbound and outbound messages altogether. WhatsApp is available for Android, iOS, BlackBerry and Windows Phone.

WhatsApp was previously rumored to be acquired by Facebook, which the former quickly denied. However, if Facebook is truly looking to acquire an SMS-alternative company, there’s still other options to choose from such as InstaMessages, Kik Messenger, Viber, and Voxer (details below). Facebook’s also been recently spotted testing a free VoIP calling in the UK for Android users that recently got an updated Facebook Messenger app, and this may signal that they are about to expand outside United States and Canada.

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4 Alternatives to WhatsApp/Instagram

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InstaMessage

This messaging app lets Instagram users talk to other Instagram users privately.  The great thing is that you don’t need to sign up for anything, as you only need to use your Instagram account to start chatting with people and celebrities, discover other InstaMessage users nearby, browse profiles as well as block other InstaMessage users from seeing your profile.

Kik Messenger

This free messaging app is available for iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Ovi and BlackBerrysmartphones.  Kik now boasts of 30 million users, and claims that they are adding as much as 100,000 users per day.

Viber

This free messaging app allows users to send texts, call, send photos as well as share user’s location to their contacts via WiFi or 3G.  Users do not need to register, as a user’s phone number serves as his Viber ID.  Also, contacts need not be exported since it uses your existing contacts sheet on your mobile device.  It is available for iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Ovi,BlackBerry and Bada.

Voxer

This is a cool app that turns your device into a Walkie Talkie as well as allow users to send messages, photos as well as make a call using the app, and group chat.  It is available for iOS and Android.

photo credit: clasesdeperiodismo via photopin cc