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Yahoo! Inc. said Tuesday it has bought venture capital-backed Maven Networks Inc. for about $160 million--the second multimedia deal the search engine company has announced since it received an unsolicited bid from Microsoft Corp. In a statement, Yahoo! said the acquisition of Cambridge, Mass.-based Maven, which provides technologies that allow companies to show video online, will expand its consumer video and advertising businesses. The announcement comes a week after Yahoo! entered into a partnership with Rhapsody America in which Rhapsody will become the exclusive on-demand music service for Yahoo!, replacing Yahoo! Music Unlimited. Rhapsody, which is owned by RealNetworks Inc. and Viacom Inc., will collaborate with Yahoo! on music downloads. Financial terms were not disclosed. Maven's platform allows publishers to deliver video content online, and it already manages and distributes online videos for at least 30 media companies, including News Corp.'s Fox News, Hearst Corp., Gannett Co. and E.W. Scripps Co.'s Scripps Networks. The company began in 2002 and raised about $27 million in venture capital financing from such investors as Prism Venture Partners of Westwood, Mass., Accel Partners of Palo Alto, Calif., and General Catalyst Partners of Cambridge. The last fundraising was a $12 million round in August, 2006. "Over the past year, Maven has emerged as the market leading video and advertising technology platform, serving some of the largest global media companies," Maven CEO Hilmi Ozguc said in a statement. "By combining our capabilities with Yahoo!'s own technology resources, publisher and advertiser relationships, and vast audience reach, we will deliver an unmatched video content syndication and advertising solution to the market." Yahoo! said it already has the largest library of professionally produced, legally licensed video content in the world and has video advertising relationships with more than three-quarters of the top TV advertisers. The Sunnyvale, Calif., company has been in the news since Feb. 4, when Microsoft said it would offer $31 a share or $44.6 billion for the search engine company to compete more effectively with Google Inc. On Monday, Yahoo! rejected the offer as too low. Yahoo! shares Tuesday were trading down 0.4% at $29.76.  Deal Video
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