Popular weather data site Weather Underground is bring acquired by the best-known weather news source in the U.S., The Weather Channel Companies.
Although the specifics of the acquisition have yet to be released, we’ll known pretty soon as they expect the deal to close in several weeks.
WU has been around for 17 years, having been founded by meteorologist and PhD Jeff Master back in 1995. Although WU is known by most for their online presence, they actually became the official weather provider for the AP back in 2005. WU is also the weather provider for Google.
Jeff Masters talked about the merger on his blog:
[I]n the past three years, Weather Underground entered into a rapid period of growth that saw our staff more than double to 57 people. With a swelling user base around the globe, and with demands for our services to be made available across so many new digital platforms like mobile phones and tablets, the board recognized the need for an even greater injection of resources, and the decision was made to merge with The Weather Channel Companies.
The Weather Channel is committed to keeping the Weather Underground brand and the web site in its current form. Weather Underground CEO Alan Steremberg will remain in charge, and our meteorologists and developers will continue to create the ground-breaking weather products that we’re renowned for. The plan is to make both wunderground.com and weather.com stronger, by sharing content and infrastructure. Many Weather Underground features, such as our Personal Weather Station data, WunderMap, and my blog, are scheduled to also appear on the weather.com web site in the coming months.
Weather blogging has always been a big part of WU, and it;s good to see Masters say that really won’t change.
“Everyone in the weather space is familiar with the strength of Weather Underground and its innovative method of presenting weather data. Weather Underground will add a great complementary, brand to our portfolio, a brand with a distinct, loyal, and active user base that will enable us to reach a unique segment of users,” said TWCC CEO David Kenny. “Most importantly, this acquisition will grow the weather expertise that is central to everything we do and will result in better forecasts and weather data for users on all of our platforms.”
Hopefully, the merger will help bring better weather to the growing majority of people who get their weather fix online. Long-time WU fans should be happy to learn that, at least as of right now, the site they know and love shouldn’t change.