Duolingo announced Tuesday it had acquired Detroit-based animation and motion design studio Hobbes. It is the mobile learning platform’s second acquisition since it went public in 2021, and shows Duolingo’s commitment to making its gamified lessons ever-more engaging.
The move comes after a quarter in which the company unveiled new AI-driven features and surpassed EPS and revenue estimates. Historically, however, it has largely stayed away from acquisitions, especially those in the language-learning space.Its last acquisition, Gunner, was another Detroit-based design and animation studio that is affiliated with Hobbes.
“Design is a critical part of Duolingo’s success, particularly our use of character illustration and animation, which really accelerated since adding Gunner to our team," said Chief Design Officer Ryan Sims. "Now we’ll be able to accelerate our use of motion-design by adding Hobbes’ unique talents to our Design team.”
Duolingo opened a Detroit office after acquiring Gunner in 2022, and Hobbes' 12 employees will nearly double the size of it.
Hobbes’ past clients have included Google, YouTube, Ford Motor Co., Zapier and Duolingo itself, where it worked on the music course launched last year. In the future, Hobbes may end up working on any part of Duolingo’s products or external marketing, according to a spokesperson.
“We value thoughtful design, from the way the buttons in our app look to the way the characters move their mouths correctly when speaking in another language,” said a spokesperson for the company. “Investing in design helps us improve retention and engagement over the long-term, which eventually leads to more users and more subscribers to Duolingo.”
A spokesperson said that Duolingo will continue to keep an eye out for companies that can help accelerate work in core areas like engineering, product developing, learning science and design. They have no more specific mergers and acquisitions plans to share at this time.
Mitra Nourbakhsh is a student at Northwestern University and one of 10 Pittsburgh Media Partnership summer interns. Mitra is interning with the Pittsburgh Business Times and can be reached at mnourbakhsh@bizjournals.com.
