Friday, 26 October 2007

Microsoft Interested In Premium Buyouts

Microsoft, the world’s top software company by sales and revenues, says it is interested in some big budgeted buyouts. Steve Ballmer, the chief executive of Microsoft has said although the company’s interest lies in big organisations, it’s likely to buy smaller technology firms.

Microsoft, the world’s top software company by sales and revenues, says it is interested in some big budgeted buyouts. Steve Ballmer, the chief executive of Microsoft has said although the company’s interest lies in big organisations, it’s likely to buy smaller technology firms.

Speaking at Web 2.0 summit in San Francisco, Ballmer said, "We'll probably buy 20 companies a year for the next four or five years. Most will be footnotes - we're talking about acquisitions of USD 50 million, USD 100 million, and USD 200 million. Those are good acquisitions that are important to us and of strategic value."

Microsoft’s most recent acquisition was aQuantive for which it paid USD 6 billion for its web advertising technology, as Microsoft wants to take on Google in the online advertising space. Microsoft trails Google and Yahoo search engine in the online advertising space.

Ballmer also said, "You've got to have a very strong advertising platform that delivers all payloads to all media with all business models: deliver to TVs, PCs, phones, and you want to be able to sell demographics and behaviour. I think the syndication business will get redefined over the next five years."