Google buys mobile ad firm

Relevant offers

World

Spoof Qantas Twitter account shut down US financial crisis chair quits mortgage firm Apple shares break above US$500 Moody's warns France, UK, others over ratings Murdoch battle looms over Sun showdown NZ called a haven for illegal Indian cash Riots as Greece approves austerity Greece strikes bailout deal Gunns keen for NZ investment to fire up mill Telstra profit soars 23 pct on mobiles

Google Inc is acquiring mobile advertising company AdMob for US$750 million, furthering the company's push into the fast-growing market of Web-enabled cell phones.

The all-stock deal gives Google, whose Android software is increasingly used to power smartphones such as the Motorola Inc Droid, an important element to monetize mobile Internet traffic.

Privately held AdMob makes technology for serving display ads on mobile phones and to track the performance of the ads.

"Mobile advertising has enormous potential as a marketing medium and while this industry is still in the early stages of development, AdMob has already made exceptional progress in a very short time," said Google VP of Product Management Susan Wojcicki.

Google, the world's No.1 Internet search engine, does not disclose how much of its revenue, which totaled nearly $22 billion in 2008, comes from mobile ads.

Last month, Google said its mobile searches increased 30 percent quarter-over-quarter in the third quarter.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt also said last month that the company was interested in resuming its acquisition efforts, after taking a breather during worst of the economic downturn. Schmidt said Google would acquire on average one company a month.

Google said the deal has been approved by both Google and AdMob and is subject to customary closing conditions.

Google's shares were up 1.8 percent at $561.12 in afternoon trading.

- Reuters