Top five web/internet companies acquired in 2007

Thanks to private equity firms, 2007 was an active year for M&A in general. But interestingly, in the web/internet space, most of the large acquisitions were done by Stretegics, the corporate acquirers, and not the private equity firms.

The sector that saw the highest activity was the Internet advertising sector; aQuantive, 24/7, DoubleClick, Right Media and a long list of others were acquired this year.

Here are the top 5 acquisitions in the Web/internet field.

(1) aQuantive - Microsoft : $6B. aQuantive is a digital marketing and technology company. It is now part of Micorosoft’s Advertiser and Publisher Solution group.

(2) WebEx - Cisco : $3.2B. Webex is a leader in the online video concerning. Cisco’s mantra? “Unified communication”. Hmm, where have I heard that before?

(3) Double Click - Google : $3.1B. The deal is not complete yet but it was approved by FTC. DoubleClick develops and provides internet ad serving service. Google + DoubleClick will rule most of the clickable space on a webpage.

(4) Club Penguin - Disney : $700M. Club penguin is a virtual world for kids. Social Web - start them when they are young.

(5) Right Media - Yahoo : $680M. Yahoo already owned 20% of Right Media and purchased the remaining 80%. Some suggest that Yahoo purchased Right Media in response to Google’s DoubleClick purchase.

Some other notable acquisitions of 2007 are:

• Postini - google : $625M. Postini is an e-mail and communication security company.
• 24/7 real Media - WPP : $649M. 24/7 is a significant player in the online advertising marketplace.
• Zimbra - Yahoo : $350M. Zimbra provides online office software.
• Adult Friendfinder - Penthouse : $500M. Adult FriendFinder is an an online adult dating site.
• How Stuff Works - Discovery : $250M. How Stuff works has expanded in to online video instructions.
• American Greetings - Webshot : $45M. This was notable because CNET purchased Webshot for $70M not too long ago. I still remember the time when Webshot was a wallpaper site.
• Business.com - Donnelly : $345M. From a directory serving Google text ads to the sale at $345M was remarkable.
• Lexico - Answers.com : $100M. Lexico owns dictionary.com and thesaurus.com. This deal was notable because Answer.com paid almost $10/unique visitor - that is on the rich side for sure.

For a more detailed list, see PartnerUp and seeking Alpha and DealBook.

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