Operator SingTel is to buy smartphone picture app company Pixable for US$26.5 million. In a statement, Allen Lew, CEO for Group Digital Life at the operator, said: “Pixable’s expertise and customer engagement give us a foundation to go beyond viewing photos to using photos as a way to stimulate simple immersive communication.”

Pixable is said to provide social web users with a “personalised photo experience”, using predictive analytics and artificial intelligence to analyse user interactions and consumption habits, and prioritise photos from friends and family. More than four million users have installed the app via the web, iOS and Android OS devices, and it is apparently seeing “rapid growth in daily downloads”.

SingTel has not detailed its plans for the app, including whether it will continue to be developed as a standalone product. Lew said that following the acquisition: “We will be able to provide a distinctive value-added service to all mobile customers, allowing them to discover and store content, images and their communication history – essentially what matters most from those that are really important to them.”