Google Inc. chief executive Eric Schmidt is confident his company's search advertising deal with Yahoo! Inc. will win U.S. Justice Department approval.
In an interview with Bloomberg television, Schmidt said, "We are going to move forward. ... We are in the process of talking to the government. They've not indicated one way or the other how they're dealing with us." The argument is that the deal would give Google too much market share as it's the dominant player in Internet search.
ComScore Inc. reported nearly
62% of searches performed in the U.S. in April, or 6.5 billion, were conducted on Google sites, a 2% rise from March. And
in May Google co-founder
Larry Page went to Washington to speak at the New American Foundation think tank, saying antitrust issues won't derail a Google-Yahoo! ad deal
because there are different ways to structure it. Published
reports said a two-week trial indicated that
Google's technology would help to boost Yahoo!'s profits and perhaps its stock price. Yahoo! CEO Jerry Yang has said the Google deal may add $800 million a year to sales.
After loosing its bid to acquire Yahoo! for about $47.5 billion, Microsoft Corp. said it wants an advertising platform that spans all digital media including television and video advertising. So in June it
acquired Navic Networks Inc., an interactive TV ad provider, for around $250 million.
In other breaking news, TheDeal.com reported Microsoft on Friday
emerged as the mystery bidder for Greenfield Online Inc. as it wrested the Internet price comparison and survey firm from the arms of Quadrangle Group LLC for $486 million. -
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