The New York Post had a big scoop this morning — Microsoft is “intensifying” its pursuit of a Yahoo! acquisition. The price tag could reach a purported $50 billion, a big bite to swallow even for the Redmond software giant.
Although rumors have floated over the years that Microsoft and Yahoo! were in merger talks, such a deal had been relatively remote — until now. Google’s seemingly unstoppable ad sales engine combined with Microsoft’s feeble attempt to take some part of the search market away from Google has pushed Microsoft to the point that it has hired Goldman Sachs to scope out a deal.
The Wall Street Journal has confirmed that the two Internet giants are “talking.” (BTW, the fact that the Post scooped the Journal is interesting given that the Post’s owner, News Corp., is trying to buy the Journal’s owner, Dow Jones.) Although an interesting development, and if such a merger would take place it would be the blockbuster deal of the year, it’s hard to see how a Microsoft-Yahoo! behemoth could be nimble enough to stay competitive in the fast-moving online ad business. Stay tuned.
Update: This blockbuster story is over before it began. The WSJ is reporting that the talks are no longer active. That’s just as well. General reaction toward the idea of the two big, lumbering companies in a merger was not favorable. As Mathew Ingram puts it, a combination of Microsoft and Yahoo! would be like roping together two icebergs.
They are like icebergs: not only is nine-tenths of them unseen, but they are slow-moving and difficult to steer. Impressive? Yes. Powerful? No doubt about it. But fast, or nimble or imaginative? No. Roping them together would do nothing but compound their problems.Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 9:09 AM | Print | Comments (1)
Vonage continues to grapple with the likely lethal verdict that found, among other things, the VoIP pioneer has infringed upon key patents held by Verizon. The court in that case ruled that Vonage must stop signing up new customers as a consequence. Although Vonage won a permanent stay of that decision pending its appeal, the company tried to vacate the original verdict in light of the landmark decision handed down by the Supreme Court on April 30 in KSR v. Teleflex (PDF of the decision here), asking for a retrial given that the Court in Teleflex opened a big door to invalidating patents.
But Vonage struck out again. On Wednesday the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (the very same court taken to task by the Supreme Court in the Teleflex decision) turned down Vonage’s request that the original verdict be vacated. Instead, the appeals court ruled, Vonage could use the Teleflex decision as it argues its appeal.
It was a nice try by Vonage to get around the big bad decision. All interpretations of the Supreme Court’s decision in KSR v. Teleflex (like all patent-related legal rulings, the issues in this case are complex and dense and too vast to summarize here) conclude that the Court has paved the way for a profusion of patent invalidations. Unfortunately, it seems, the KSR v. Teleflex decision arrived too late to do Vonage much good.
Posted by Cynthia Brumfield at 7:50 AM | Print | Comments (0)
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