Google has bought Wavii, the Seattle-based startup behind a news summarisation app, for roughly $30 million in cash. Google's swooped on the outfit after Apple expressed interest in buying Wavii to incorporate the startup's natural language technology into Siri.

The search engine wanted the technology after Yahoo paid a similar amount to acquire Summly, the news reader and Wavii competitor. The deals have taken out of play two small companies that sought to enhance news content on mobiles. Wavii's investors included Paypal co-founder Max Levchin, former Facebook executive Dave Morin, and Fritz Lanman who used to work at Microsoft.

Most of the startup's employees are expected to relocate to Google's headquarters in Mountain View, California.