Pinterest in talks to acquire VSCO photo app maker

Pinterest Inc. has held talks to buy Visual Supply Co., maker of the VSCO photo-editing app, according to a New York Times report citing two people with knowledge of the matter.

The 10-year-old platform shares some of the early appeal of Instagram, offering a distinctive set of film-like photo filters along with an image editor. The company, still focused on its titular product, has added video-editing tools and raised $90 million in funding, and was last valued at $550 million, the paper reported.

Discussions with Pinterest, another company centered on images and visual expression, are ongoing and a deal price couldn’t be learned, the report said.

A year ago, VSCO cut 45 jobs in response to the coronavirus outbreak, with Chief Executive Officer Joel Flory explaining on LinkedIn that the startup “would need to shift towards running a self-sustaining business.” For Pinterest, which functions as a place to collect and share images, acquiring the VSCO editing suite and user base would help grow its audience and potentially enhance what its own mobile app can do.

Both Pinterest and VSCO representatives declined to comment on deal discussions to the paper. VSCO is focused on expanding the business and is “always meeting with different companies across the creative space at any given time,” spokeswoman Julie Inouye told the New York Times.