Japanese firm acquires Bengaluru-based Cucumbertown

Cucumbertown, a Bengaluru-based social network for cooks and chefs, has been acquired by Cookpad, a Tokyo-based recipe network, for an undisclosed amount.

Cucumbertown has two offices, in the Bay Area and Bengaluru, and will remain an independent subsidiary under Cookpad, said co-founder Cherian Thomas.

“This acquisition will enable Cucumbertown to scale to international markets and monetize. The terms of the deal have not been made public but this is among the larger acquisitions that Cookpad has made,” he said. The India team will continue to expand rapidly with focus on design, engineering and data analytics talent.

Launched in October 2012, Cucumbertown’s founders work from three locations: the US, Switzerland and India. From a simple recipe-sharing network, Cucumbertown has grown to a food blogging platform that allows users in over 160 countries to customize their blogs with themes and custom domains.

Cherian said, “Cooks, who started publishing on Cucumbertown, later moved on to start their own food blogs. That’s when we saw a gap in the market and decided to launch the food blogging platform.

The company has raised capital from Silicon Valley and followed that with Helion and Ludlow ventures. It also plans to monetize and pass on the revenue to users, confirmed Mr. Thomas.