Facebook Reportedly Developing Professional Edition

Facebook is reportedly working in secret on an office version of its site that would compete with LinkedIn, while offering collaboration features comparable to those of Google’s online applications.

The site, called ‘Facebook at Work’, would allow users to “chat with colleagues, connect with professional contacts and collaborate over documents”, the FT reported on Monday, citing unnamed sources familiar with the project.

Privacy

The site is to be visually similar to Facebook, but will reportedly have stricter privacy options.

Such an effort was also reported in June by TechCrunch, which said at the time that the project was being developed by Facebook staff in London.

The ‘at-work’ version of Facebook is planned to be available on the web as well as iOS, Android and other mobile platforms, and is planned to be free of charge, at least initially, according to TechCrunch’s source.

The report speculated that ‘FB@Work’ would allow Facebook collaboration tools to be used something like the way that Facebook employees already make use of them, exchanging messages through Messages and using Groups that are coordinated with the company’s human resources database.

Heavy investment

Facebook said last month its quarterly profit nearly doubled from the previous quarter to $802 million (£513m), but its shares sank due to concerns over its plans to continue investing heavily in future projects.

“We are going to continue preparing for the future by investing aggressively, connecting everyone, understanding the world, and building the next-generation in computing platforms,” said chief executive Mark Zuckerberg during the earnings call.

Facebook completed an £11.4bn deal to buy mobile messaging application WhatsApp in October.

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