Online advertising network DoubleClick will become part of Google in an all cash deal valued at $3.1 billion, giving Google a big third-party ad serving network.
It was just a few hours ago that we mentioned Google’s crazy approach to buying companies. Of note was their $1.65 billion purchase of YouTube, now the catalyst for Big Media ire and lawsuits.
That $1.65 billion turned out to be a speedbump on the way to Google’s deal with private equity firm Hellman & Friedman. And unlike the YouTube deal, the purchase of DoubleClick is straight cash.
Two of Google’s power trio offered quotes in the announcement of the deal:
“It has been our vision to make Internet advertising better – less intrusive, more effective, and more useful. Together with DoubleClick, Google will make the Internet more efficient for end users, advertisers, and publishers,” said Sergey Brin, Google’s Co-Founder & President, Technology.
“DoubleClick’s technology is widely adopted by leading advertisers, publishers and agencies, and the combination of the two companies will accelerate the adoption of Google’s innovative advances in display advertising,” said Eric Schmidt, Chief Executive Officer of Google.
Mildly interesting as quotes go. Salman Ullah, Google’s director of corporate development, had a better one when talking up Google’s crazy acquisitions strategy in Los Angeles:
“We don’t do traffic for traffic’s sake,” he said. “It has to be highly monetizable.”
As we said this morning, when it comes to finding buys that can make Google more valuable, they are crazy as a fox. Google probably found the best third-party ad serving prospect outside of AOL’s Advertising.com and spent the money for it.
