Amazon has bought video-game streaming service Twitch for $970 million (£585 million). The service was previously reported to be in the final stages of acquisition talks with Google’s YouTube. The move is expected to bolster Amazon’s streaming offering which already includes subscriptions through its Prime service.

"Broadcasting and watching gameplay is a global phenomenon and Twitch has built a platform that brings together tens of millions of people who watch billions of minutes of games each month," said Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos in a statement. "We look forward to learning from them and helping them move even faster to build new services for the gaming community," he added.