• All Things D, Thursday, December 29, 2011 9:28 AM

Groupon has acquired the pre-launch social communication start-up Campfire Labs, the companies confirmed. Word of the deal had first been reported on TechCrunch. Campfire CEO and co-founder Naveen Koorakula said his company’s full team an estimated seven people would join Groupon to head up its social efforts. No financial terms were disclosed.

Groupon had been actively trying to buy other social start-ups such as Gowalla, sources had said in recent weeks. That particular deal went to Facebook.  Campfire, which had named its early product Slice, was kind of like a dynamic version of Beluga — the group messaging start-up Facebook bought. Campfire was Web-based, with chat, calendar and media-sharing tools.

The company is still a ways away from launching, and working on testing the product on campuses like Kenyon College first. 

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