Google acquired a whopping 57 companies of various assets through September, according to an SEC filing. With three months left to go in the year, anyone want to guess what else is on the radar?
Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) spent more than $1.4 billion to purchase 57 companies of various sizes and persuasions, blasting apart the company's previous record of 48 acquisitions from 2010.
The search engine provider revealed in a 10-Q filing with the SEC that it paid $941 million in cash for three deals that included:
- ITA Software - A flight reservations software company for $676 million.
- Zagat - A restaurant review guide in April for $151 million.
- Daily Deals - An online daily deals service for $114 million in September.
Google paid another $502 million in the aggregate for 54 other smaller companies, according to Google.
On August 15, 2011, Google announced a bid to acquire Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion, but that isn't likely to close until 2012, due to current regulatory scrutiny.
Google isn't done with M&A either. The company spent that much and picked up that many assets only through September, which means that it acquired more than 6 companies a month to date. With 3 months left in the new year, it's possible Google could tack another 10 or 15 purchases before 2012.
Why buy all of these companies and what's the grand plan? Most of the buys have been cloud-based players that bolster the company's local search, advertising, video and social services services.
Ultimately, Google is weaving a fresh tapestry of Web services and applications into its Google+ social network, which it hopes to make the center of the user experience.
ITA has been leveraged in Google Flight Search. Zagat will be used in Google Places for local business search.
Daily Deals, along with loyalty card provider Punch, coupon provider Zave Networks and daily deals aggregator DealMap will likely be used to fortify the Google Offers deals and Google Wallet mobile payment services.
Google's YouTube arm bought video producer Next New Networks, which is being used to help fashion new channels on YouTube, as well as Flick for social sentiment analysis and Green Parrot Pictures for video processing.
COMMENTARY: Google's recent acquisition of Motorola Mobility was its largest by far, but let's look at the search giant's major acquisitions over the past 11 years. Here are the highlights of the major ones:
- In total, Google has acquired 102 companies with Motorola Mobility being their biggest one to date. Google paid $12.5 billion for the company, but it still awaits regulatory approval.
- Other big acquisitions include DoubleClick in 2007 ($3.1 billion), YouTube in 2006 ($1.65 billion), as well as buying a 5% stake in AOL in 2005 ($1 billion).
- Of all the companies Google has bought, 74 were based in the United States, 6 in Canada, 5 in Germany, 4 in the UK, 2 in Australia, and 2 in Israel.
- In 2001, they bought only two companies. In sharp contrast, last year that number peaked at 26 and this year, they have already acquired 18 different companies. That’s 44 companies in 20 months. Someone said recession?
Those were the highlights. And here’s the “big picture.”
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Courtesy of an article dated October 27, 2011 appearing in eWeek.com and an article dated September 3, 2011 appearing in IntoMobile
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