From search engine giant to advertising beast

E-Brief News reports that the search giant has reached a deal to purchase DoubleClick, the online advertising company, from two private equity firms for $3.1bn in cash – almost double what it paid for YouTube. Google says that the acquisition will combine DoubleClick’s expertise in ad management technology for media buyers and sellers with Google’s advertising platform and publisher monetisation service. As with the YouTube deal, the agreement has raised numerous legal concerns, particularly over privacy and competition issues.

Microsoft has called for intervention in the deal, reports ITWeb. The company’s senior VP and general counsel Brad Smith said: \'This proposed acquisition raises serious competition and privacy concerns in that it gives the Google DoubleClick combination unprecedented control in the delivery of online advertising, and access to a huge amount of consumer information by tracking what customers do online. We think this merger deserves close scrutiny from regulatory authorities to ensure a competitive online advertising market.\' But not all are concerned. According to The New York Times, when Google announced its intention to purchase DoubleClick, analyst approval abounded, which is in contrast to the head scratching that followed the news of the YouTube deal. Full ITWeb report Full report in The New York Times

There is growing speculation that the DoubleClick deal will leave online publishers in a bind. Some in the online advertising industry wonder if Google DoubleClick will own so much market share that advertisers will build their relationships with it, an intermediate, rather than the publishers themselves. According to an Internet News report, the early favourite to buy DoubleClick was Google rival Microsoft, which was said to bid near $2bn for the company. Microsoft, a Google competitor, isn\'t alone in worrying about Google\'s new position of power. DoubleClick\'s competitors have their own dark visions of the future this merger might bring. One such competitor is Seevast, which is the parent company of Pulse 360, an online advertising network, which offers contextual sponsored links to compete with Google and DoubleClick offerings. Seevast President Mark Josephson told Internet News his concern is for online publishers. ‘It\'s becoming increasingly worrisome for the Web\'s top publishers as Google continues to own more and more of the industry and the value chain,’ Josepheson said. Full Internet News report

In other Google matters, the search company will begin selling advertisements across all of the stations of Clear Channel Communications, the top radio station owner in the US, at the end of June. Google has been working for months to expand its ad sales operation into traditional media, but to do so it needs traditional media to allow it to sell some of their ads, reports The New York Times. The deal will run for several years and will give Google access to just under 5% of Clear Channel’s commercial time. Full report in The New York Times

Moving to news of other big online advertisers: Yahoo has expanded its relationship with the newspaper industry with its announcement that five publishing companies have joined a consortium working with the Internet giant to sell advertising online. Yahoo and the publishers also agreed to share local articles from the newspapers across Yahoo\'s large news network, to sell local advertising online and to use Yahoo\'s graphical advertising technology on newspaper sites. The Mercury News says that the new venture will broaden the scope beyond its initial plan to only sell help-wanted ads. Full Mercury News report