Facebook has followed up its move on Gowalla's executive team by acquiring another major player in the location-based space, Glancee.

The social discovery app has been purchased by Facebook for an undisclosed fee, with the firm's top brass set to aid Facebook as it makes a renewed play in the location scene.

Love for location

Critics of Facebook's current check-in system have described it as a token effort, which fails to connect users in a meaningful sense.

It appears Glancee has been brought on board to address such concerns, with Facebook stating the firm's founders will "join the Facebook team to work on products that help people discover new places and share them with friends."

For its part, Glancee has stated on its website it is "very excited" to have been purchased by Facebook, claiming the acquisition will help it further its original aims.

Mobile matters

"We started Glancee in 2010 with the goal of bringing together the best of your physical and digital worlds," adds the firm.

"We wanted to make it easy to discover the hidden connections around you, and to meet interesting people. Since then Glancee has connected thousands of people, empowering serendipity and pioneering social discovery.

"We are therefore very excited to announce that Facebook has acquired Glancee and that we have joined the team in Menlo Park to build great products for over 900 million Facebook users."

The move also represents an effort to increase Facebook's footprint on mobile – the social network having admitted it's so far failed to adequately monetise its operations on smartphones - following the firm's $1 billion cash and shares buyout of photo-sharing app Instagram.

[source: CNET]