doubleclick madness

I can’t believe the figures being bandied about for the sale of Doubleclick.. even the initial figure of a $2bn bid by Microsoft sounded high. Now supposedly there is a $2.6bn bid by Google.

I can see the reasons for either party buying Doubleclick – Microsoft is losing the battle to Google in the advertising space and it will complement their offering. Google is already in this space so not sure if there is a benefit for them other than stopping Microsoft?

It would certainly be great for Hellman & Friedman who bought Doubleclick for $1.1bn only 2 years ago.

But there have been several acquisitions by Doubleclick recently (Falk, Tangozebra, Klipmart) so there are multiple ad tracking systems inside the company – I guess there must be some form of consolidation going on internally? Seems to me to be a difficult time to be buying Doubleclick at an expensive price when you look at their turnover. Maybe Atlas is a cheaper alternative? Though even they have just bought Accipiter.

Riaz Kanani

Founder of Radiate B2B, which helps companies target advertising at specific companies usually as part of an account based marketing programme.

I have spent almost two decades building startups or expanding fast growth companies in a variety of functions - from tech to operations to marketing, with a little corp dev on the side.

Always up for a discussion on building tech businesses and the latest tech trends. Tweet me.