Apple Acquires Swell To Boost iTunes Radio, MacBook Pro Upgrades

Let’s face it, Apple’s iTunes Radio has not been as exciting as some rumors suggested it would be a while ago. That does not mean Apple is not going to improve it. According to Re/code, Apple is close to acquiring Swell. The deal is for about $30m. As a part of the deal, the Swell app will shut down  this week. For those of you not familiar with Swell, it is an app designed to let you listen to personalized audio news and information from around the web.

It will be interesting to see how Apple puts Swell to good use. But iTunes Radio could always be improved in many areas. The company has also acquired BookLamp, which we expect will be used to improve iBooks in the future.

Speaking of new products and features, Apple is expected to announce new MacBook Pro machines very soon. Rumors suggest that 13″ and 15″ models will be upgraded. These machines will get faster Haswell processors. The low-end 15″ model is going to get a bump in RAM, going to 16 GB. You are going to have to wait a bit to get your hands on MacBooks with Broadwell chips though.