Google aquires VoIP, mobile ad outfits

November 10, 2009 | 11:52

Tags: #admob #google-acquisition #google-talk

Companies: #google

Indications are that Google has acquired two companies in the last day, making a play for dominance in the voice-over-IP and mobile advertising sectors.

The Silicon Valley Insider reported yesterday that the search giant has purchased mobile advertising specialist AdMob for a whopping $750 million in stock, in order to increase its advertising exposure on platforms including the popular iPhone - and increase it shall, with indications showing that AdMob served a whopping 10.2 billion adverts in September of this year, with 2.6 billion of those to iPhone and iPod Touch users.

While Google already advertises to mobile users via text-based adverts on its search engine - which will continue - its acquisition of AdMob gives it presence in the graphical banner advertising and ad-sponsored application sectors as well. In a comment regarding the deal, the company claimed that the deal will "bring new innovation and competition to mobile advertising, and will lead to more effective tools for creating, serving, and analyzing emerging mobile ads formats," while benefiting "developers, publishers, and advertisers by improving the performance of mobile advertising, and will provide users with more free or low-cost mobile apps."

While the purchase of AdMob is the biggest deal the company has made for a while, yesterday also saw the - as yet unconfirmed - claim that Google has also purchased voice-over-IP specialist Gizmo5 in order to enhance its Google Voice and Google Talk offerings. A report over on TechCrunch claims that the deal sees Gizmo5 bringing its PSTN-to-VoIP infrastructure to Google's Talk platform, allowing calls to be made to and from the service from a plain old telephone system - something the service has been lacking compared to rivals including the popular Skype.

While indications are that the Gizmo5 deal is for the lesser - although still impressive - sum of $30 million, the deal is allegedly in cold hard cash rather than stock.

Both deals come as Engadget receives a set of screenshots which apparently show Google's future appearance: a Wave-inspired unified interface which will tie the company's disparate products together.

Do you believe that Google's purchases show a canny understanding of the future, or are you disappointed to see the company branching out into advertising-sponsored apps and banner ads? Share your thoughts over in the forums.
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