OUR BLOGS

<!-- JSON-LD markup generated by Google Structured Data Markup Helper. -->
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context" : "http://schema.org",
"@type" : "Article",
"name" : "Bizarre Technology Acquisitions",
"author" : {
"@type" : "Person",
"name" : "majestic"
},
"image" : "https://www.sgstechnologies.net/sites/default/files/2020-01/bg1_19.jpg",
"articleSection" : "We�ve witnessed some very bizarre tech corporate acquisitions over the past couple of years or so, particularly when it comes to Internet companies.",
"articleBody" : "Who would have foreseen a company like Google buy a wind energy company or a company such as News Corp. buy MySpace. But it�s really hard to predict if any of these puzzling acquisitions might actually pay off in the long run. We all know the extravagant $30 million acquisition proposition made by Yahoo to Summly�s 17-year-old owner Nick D�Aloisio who apparently is in London still finishing school, but yahoo when it had shut down summly later said �We just wanted the kid�. Peculiar?</P>\n\n<P><IMG src=\"/core/themes/sgs/images/bizarre.png\" style=\"width:50%;\"/></P>\n\n<P>This is only a small gist of the long list of bizarre tech industry acquisitions, to start off let�s consider the Microsoft�s attempt to buy Apple stock in 1997. How could we ever forget Steve Jobs standing on a stage with a giant video shot of Bill Gates in the background? The image said it all � the world tech leader was hanging over its new investment, the tiny, struggling Apple. Microsoft needed its 15% share of Apple and this was right after Steve Jobs return to rejuvenate Apple.</P>\n\n<P>The start of 20th century saw the Time Warner acquisition by AOL. This acquisition happened just before the Internet fell off the cliff. But the actually question is do we still remember AOL Time Warner? Or for that matter remember AOL at all? The company couldn�t make the transition to broadband profitably, and the branding went back to Time Warner.</P>\n\n<P>Later in 2002, we saw Hewlett-Packard acquiring PC maker Compaq for a whooping $25 billion in an attempt to confront Dell. A merger this big is never a good sign and HP certainly was no exception to this. All the commotion gave way to a golden opportunity for IBM to make its way into the server-storage-services market. Nevertheless, that was not the end of it, Wall Street was not quite happy about the deal which lead to the step down of CEO Carly Fiorina in 2005 with shares at half the price when she started in 1999. The Compaq deal was seen as a massively bad move.</P>\n\n<P>Three years later happened the big eBay-Skype acquisition. Ecommerce auction leader eBay bought Skype in 2005 for $2.6 billion hoping that online buyers and sellers would prefer face time over email. But to the awe of eBay, online buyers and sellers did actually preferred email over facetime when interacting with complete strangers over the internet that too for completing a deal. After four years, eBay sold Skype to private investors for $1.9 billion which was later acquired by Microsoft in 2011 for a bulky $8.5 billion.</P>\n\n<P>Here�s the best of all, Intel investment arm (Intel Capital) bought an elderly care website. Intel Capital�s president Arvind Sodhani said that this was a company�s initiative in lieu of cultivating promising areas for tomorrow�s innovation. The actual question that rose in many of us was, Come again!</P>\n\n<P>Last but not the least, In 2011, Wal-Mart bought Kosmix, A web startup search engine; and One Riot, a social media analytics solutions company. Since when did Wal-Mart want to be a tech company? Or was it walmart�s way of strengthening its ecommerce chops for mobile buyers. It�s again very hard to say! Well discussed above are some of the major tech acquisitions that till date puzzle us but nonetheless as users of technology we have no complaints at the rate at which this industry is growing each day! So let�s sit back and watch as these and other tech companies continue to make some more bizarre mergers and acquisitions which will always be a head-scratcher!",
"url" : "https://www.sgstechnologies.net/blog/bizarre-technology-acquisitions",
"publisher" : {
"@type" : "Organization",
"name" : "SGS"
}
}
</script>