Instagram’s Co-founder Claims Facebook Saw Them as a Threat

The post Instagram’s Co-founder Claims Facebook Saw Them as a Threat appeared first on Android Headlines.

Apr 23, 2025 - 11:57

Summary: Instagram’s co-founder recently testified during Meta’s antitrust case, where he revealed that Facebook saw Instagram as a threat. His testimony also revealed that Facebook apparently withheld resources from Instagram to give Facebook the edge.

Why do companies acquire other companies? There are many reasons for that. For starters, it would be to acquire a set of customers or a piece of technology they currently do not have. It would also help to boost the company’s existing products, like when Apple bought Shazam and integrated it into iOS.

Seeing Instagram as a threat

However, in Meta’s case, it acquired companies because it didn’t want to bother competing with them. At least that’s what the FTC is accusing Meta of doing in its antitrust lawsuit against the company. Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, has denied those accusations, but a testimony by Instagram’s co-founder, Kevin Systrom, stated that the reason Facebook acquired the company was because they saw Instagram as a threat.

Both Zuckerberg and Systrom had different ideas when Facebook acquired Instagram. For Zuckerberg, he apparently wanted to quash a rising competitor. For Systrom, he thought Facebook would help boost Instagram’s growth. And it did, but it wasn’t entirely because of Facebook.

Systrom was quoted as saying, “We were a threat to their growth. If Instagram didn’t grow as quickly, Facebook wouldn’t shrink as quickly, or plateau as quickly. I don’t think he [Zuckerberg] ever said it out loud that way, but that was the only reason we were having this discussion.”

Withholding resources from Instagram

He also cited examples of how Facebook seemed to withhold resources from Instagram purposely. For example, when Facebook started to focus more on video content, the company put together a team of 300 employees. However, Instagram received no additional employees.

There was also another time following the Cambridge Analytica data scandal. Zuckerberg had pledged to invest billions of dollars into trust and safety resources. But once again, Instagram received “zero” of the billions of dollars.

That said, it’s easy to understand why Zuckerberg might see Instagram as a threat. Facebook is, after all, Zuckerberg’s baby. Any business owner would be thrilled if their product did as well as Instagram. However, since the alleged reason Facebook acquired Instagram was to kill off competition instead of bolstering its own products and services, we get why Zuckerberg might have been annoyed that things went the opposite way.

The post Instagram’s Co-founder Claims Facebook Saw Them as a Threat appeared first on Android Headlines.