Google buys Oxford graduates app - graduate jobs

A visual search start up application founded by two Oxford graduates has been bought by Google as it plans to acquire a new company each month.

Plink allows mobile phones to analyse pictures of well-known artwork and then identifies them. Users can then share the photo with friends and click through to buy a poster version.

The app was created two years ago by PhD students Mark Cummins and James Philbin as PlinkArt. Media giant Google discovered it during the Android Developer Challenge where the Oxford graduates won $100,000 (£65,000) for innovation in app building.

The creators of Plink say that it was downloaded more than 50,000 times in just six weeks, in a measure of its attraction to the Android app buying public.

The next exciting innovation could be Google Goggles, which Cummins and Philbin are being lined up to work on.