Twitter is said to be in talks with several buyers to explore a potential takeover. The microblogging site has been struggling with a stagnating user base. Many companies are reportedly interested in making a bid for the company, including Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, and Verizon.
According to CNBC, sources claim that the company has received several expressions of interest from various media and technology companies. Twitter is likely to receive a formal bid soon.
Salesforce seems like an unlikely contender for Twitter. However, its chief digital evangelist Vala Afshar tweeted his personal views favoring Twitter. Salesforce declined to comment on the reports. Earlier this year, Salesforce was reported to be bidding for LinkedIn, which was eventually bought by Microsoft for $26.2 billion.
Tech Crunch reported that Twitter is an attractive acquisition target, due to its huge cache of data. Twitter has a user base of 313 million monthly active users, who generate a massive amount of real-time data. However, Twitter's other likely suitor--Google--may be taking one more shot at going social. Google has attempted social media several times, without any impressive results. Twitter's acquisition may help Google to expand its advertisement platform business as well.
Other contenders such as Microsoft and Verizon could also make good use of Twitter's assets. However, Verizon recently agreed to buy the web assets of Yahoo and may not want to risk another expensive acquisition.