Walmart may have been slow to embrace the online space in the mid 90’s when dot-com fever first heated up, but it isn’t making the same mistake the second time around as the digital world undergoes the mobile and social revolution.

Walmart’s acquisition of Kosmix will shorten the company’s social media learning curve and open the door for some intriguing new possibilities, even if those possibilities aren’t quite clear just yet.

What is clear is Walmart is intent on being a multichannel operator, and social media is viewed as the new Holy Grail when it comes to engaging with customers. It is an opportunity that Walmart can’t afford to miss, so it did what big companies tend to do when they discover a deficiency in their operations. It went looking for an acquisition to shore up its capabilities and found Kosmix.

So what does Kosmix do?