Google has acquired Pixate, a maker of software that helps developers build mobile prototypes running on iOS and Android. Google describes Pixate as a "visual prototyping platform" for creating complete app prototypes that run natively in iOS and Android, as well as crafting realistic choreographed interactions. It's also used for collaborating across product teams by sharing those experiences on different devices.
According to Pixate CEO Paul Colton "Our small team at Pixate has some really big ideas, and with the help of Google we’ll be able to bring those ideas to the design community at scale. We’ve become an essential part of the workflow for tens of thousands of designers, and are excited about expanding our mission at Google to reach millions of product teams worldwide."
He added that starting today we’re making Pixate Studio free and dramatically reducing the cost of the Pixate cloud service as you can read all about that in our FAQ.
Google won't be killing off the service. Instead, the OS X and Windows desktop app for creating prototypes, Pixate Studio, will be free while Google encourages designers to move to the Pixate cloud, which will be charged at $5 per designer per month, or $50 per designer per year.
Pixate users who had paid for the studio license will get a $150 credit towards a Pixate cloud account, while the transition to Google will see the removal of the formerly available free cloud level. In its place Google will introduce be a 60-day Pixate cloud trial.
