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Microsoft Pays $6 billion for aQuantive: Massive Ad Network Consolidation Is Occuring

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

Breaking: Microsoft is acquiring advertising network aQuantive, the parent company to Avenue A | Razorfish, Atlas and DRIVEpm, for roughly $6 billion in an all-cash transaction, the company said this morning.aQuantive is a public company (AQNT) and had a market cap of just $2.8 billion as of yesterday. The acquisition price of $6 billion is a roughly 2x premium on yesterday’s closing price. The acquisition comes after recent big acquisitions by Google and Yahoo in this space. Google bought Doubleclick for $3.1 billion in April. Later that same month, Yahoo acquired competitor RightMedia for $680 million. Just yesterday, WPP Group acquired yet another company in this space, 24/7 Real Media, for $649 million.

aQuantive’s operating companies include both tools and ad agencies. The company is located in Seattle.

Microsoft is holding a media call at 5:45 AM PST to discuss the transaction. I’ll update this post with more details afterwards. [ Via TechCrunch ]

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