Automattic has done a lot growth recently. We never stopped hiring, and we’ve made some great acquisitions which brought excellent products and even better talent onto the team.
Yesterday, it was announced that Automattic is acquiring Woo. You might know them for their great Themes and eCommerce plugin. Here’s some essential reading:
Woo & Automattic | Matt Mullenweg
WooThemes Joins Automattic | The WooThemes Blog
WooThemes has a new home | Mark Forrester
We are joining Automattic | Magnus Jepson
Or if you’re in the AV club here’s a video:
And finally this, from Nick Hamze:
Alex Gustafson 
One reply on “Woo Joins Automattic”
The main reason seems to the lure of getting Woo Commerce. It does have 24% of the eCommerce market for WordPress. That is also not going to make the other WP eCommerce developers very happy. My concern is that this starts a trend away from a more open sourced model and that development of WordPress is ever going to be more centralized by Automattic.
That is not necessarily a bad thing, but it is a different thing. It also shows where Automattic thinks the future is for WordPress.
Ghost, anyone?
Truth in labeling department, I use Woo’s Canvas Theme a lot and WooCommerce exclusively.