Peter Chun

Sources close to the deal reveal that the acquisition was ~150M USD.

Why this makes sense. . operating under the ad.com umbrella, you now have a strong reputable ad network that performs on various pricing modes (CPC, CPM, CPA) side by side with an affiliate network that will likely leverage alot from ad.com

There’s alot of operational leverage that buy.at can capitalize on. Merging the ad.com technology will also create scale and a “more” integrated platform for buy.at.

Lastly…uniting AOL’s properties puts them straight into the servicing game with an ad network, affiliate network, universal data feed utilities and an SEM agency.

CJ with VLCK, Performics with DCLK, LinkShare with Rakuten and now Buy.at with AOL creates a landgrab for premier retailers in the space. Expect AOL to go after Quigo/Ad.com clients aggressively over the next 9-15 months as well. If you thought price cuts were one of the challenges to the affiliate space, get ready for some more.

Wow.

Google misses earnings, stock plummets, people “freak” out - before some thoughts, here are some facts:

• Total paid clicks in the fourth quarter rose 30% compared to the same period in 2006, but slower than the 45-52% growth seen during the first three quarter of 2007
• Most disappointing probably was the number of aggregate paid clicks which increased just 9% during the quarter
• For the first time since its initial public offering three years ago, Google’s quarterly profit failed to climbed more than 25%
• Overall, Google reported fourth quarter net income of $1.21 billion, or $3.79 per diluted share, up nicely from $1.03 billion, or $3.29 per diluted share, in the same quarter last year but, the earnings per share number excluding items came in at $4.43, below the consensus analyst estimate of $4.47. Revenue also fell short by $60 million

Now for some Thoughts

• Google search market share is the largest it has ever been (through December of 2007)
• The online advertising market continues to grow with healthy projections into 2012 (with search leading the charge)
• Google adjusted clickable areas through the paid search (top listings) from the “shaded area” to the actual “advertisement” to reduce what they call “invalid” clicks (different from fraud clicks, as they cast a wider net of false positives to catch invalid activity before it needs to be accounted for)
• Google’s investments and entry into new markets/products/services will need to come together over the next few years - the dependency on the advertising business unit will continue to become an issue
• Google needs to diversify the revenue mix and need to manage the street’s/investors expectations - they’re growing…don’t forget that