Yahoo acquires Xobni, aims for smarter contacts in its services (updated)

Yahoo must be starting the summer with an acquisition spree: it bought Qwiki yesterday, and it's buying Xobni today in a deal that AllThingsD estimates is worth $30 million to $40 million. The acquisition gives Yahoo a developer with experience in creating automatic, connected address books -- a perfect fit for a web giant that has been revamping its email and social services. Neither of the new partners is talking about what they'll create together, although Xobni is no longer accepting new customers for its paid services and has pulled downloads for both Smartr Contacts on Android and Xobni for BlackBerry. It's a gentler transition than we've seen with other takeovers, although we wouldn't get too comfy when most of Xobni's services go dark after July 2nd of next year.

Update: Our colleagues at TechCrunch hear that the acquisition price may be over $60 million.