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Google Is Said to Work on News Product Competing With Snapchat

The New Product, Stamp would put up articles in mobile magazine-like design like Snapchat.

Google Is Said to Work on News Product Competing With Snapchat
People ride a moving walkway in front of a sign featuring Google Inc.’s logo at the company’s Asia-Pacific headquarters during its opening day in Singapore (Photographer: Ore Huiying/Bloomberg)  

(Bloomberg) -- Alphabet Inc.’s Google is working with publishers on a news product called Stamp that would serve up articles in a mobile magazine-like design, similar to Snapchat’s Discover service, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Stamp evolved from media relationships Google already has for another one of its products, called AMP, which is meant to help load articles faster. The Wall Street Journal reported the talks earlier.

“The success of the open source AMP project is down to the constant collaboration with publishers that involves working early on upcoming features,” Google said Friday in a statement. “We don’t have anything to announce at the moment but look forward to sharing more soon.”

Snap Inc., the parent company of Snapchat, is under pressure as it works to prove that its photo- and video-sharing application serves up something unique to users. While Snap has invented several new ways of communicating on mobile phones, Facebook Inc. has been steadily copying its most popular products. Now Google is following Snap’s creations, too. Snap has been changing the Discover function of its application, with plans to focus on more episodic video content.

To contact the reporters on this story: Gerry Smith in New York at gsmith233@bloomberg.net, Sarah Frier in San Francisco at sfrier1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jillian Ward at jward56@bloomberg.net, Crayton Harrison at tharrison5@bloomberg.net, Andrew Pollack, Alistair Barr