Microsoft confirms acquisition of Wunderlist app maker 6Wunderkinder

Microsoft today announced that it has acquired 6Wunderkinder, the German company behind task-management app Wunderlist.

Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.

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The announcement confirms reports of the deal earlier this month. VentureBeat reported a couple of weeks ago that the deal was very likely to happen, for less than $250 million. Earlier this week the Wall Street Journal reported that the deal was going down for $100 million to $200 million.

Microsoft said today that customers can expect the app to remain free: “There will be no price changes for Wunderlist Pro or Wunderlist for Business customers and the service will continue to support a wide range of third-party apps and integrated services.”

The deal follows Microsoft’s acquisitions of hip, mobile-friendly startups like Acompli, which had an email and calendar app that has since been turned into the new Microsoft Outlook, and Sunrise, a calendar app. A few weeks ago 6Wunderkinder announced an integration of Wunderlist inside of Sunrise.

The world is rich with task management apps, including Any.do, Asana, Todoist, Trello, and Wrike.

Wunderlist has received praise over the years for its simplicity. It has a nifty speech-recognition feature and a cute thumb piano sound that plays whenever you complete a task. And there are paid options like Wunderlist Pro and Wunderlist for Business. It’s unclear how many people pay to use Wunderlist instead of just using it for free — although you can say the same thing about some of Wunderlist’s competitors.

The Sunrise acquisition proved that there’s room for task lists inside of a calendar — and presumably other Microsoft apps for both consumers and businesspeople.

The Wunderlist app could come in handy for Microsoft, particularly for taking notes on a mobile device. Microsoft’s OneNote team heaps words of praise on Wunderlist in a blog post on the deal:

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The acquisition of this market-leading to-do list app known for its simplicity, ease of use and innovative design fits squarely with our ambition to reinvent productivity and help people achieve more across all major platforms and devices — particularly on mobile.

6wunderkinder started in 2010. In 2013, the startup announced a $30 million funding round. Investors include Atomico, Earlybird, Sequoia Capital, and T-Venture.

In a 2013 interview, 6wunderkinder founder and chief executive Christian Reber told German online magazine t3n that two years before Sequoia invested — which was the first time it had backed a German startup — the firm sent Reber an email with the subject line “Sequoia loves you.” Sequoia has previously backed several other startups that have picked up usage among consumers and have gradually become popular for business use, including Dropbox and Evernote.

Wunderlist is available on Windows PCs, Windows Phone, Mac, Chromebook, iOS, Android, Kindle Fire, and the Web. The app had more than 11 million users as of February. Currently it has more than 13 million users.

People have created more than 1 billion to-do items in the app, Reber wrote in a blog post on the acquisition.

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Reber noted that he’ll continue to head up Wunderlist’s team and product strategy.