Sometimes I think we all forget how important a healthy big company ethos is for our industry. The big four on the Internet – Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and AOL – all provide the lion’s share of revenues to the industry via check-writing from an AdSense or Advertising.com-like services but they also provide the acquisition engines to provide exit paths for smaller companies. These acquisitions help the larger concerns remain vital, to grow and to provide new management. They also provide venture capitalists with a way to get liquid on their investments in smaller growth companies.
I was reading a piece in Portfolio Magazine and it reminded me of how aggressive Yahoo had been in terms of buying up smaller companies during the last dozen years or so.
Check this out:
1997 - Net Controls
1998 - Classic Games, ViaWeb, Yoyodyne
1999 - Broadcast.com, Geocities
2000 - eGroups, Kimo
2001 - Sold.com, LaunchMedia
2002 - HotJobs, Inktomi
2003 - Overture
2004 - Kelkoo, Musicmatch
2005 - Alibaba, Flickr, Del.icio.us
2006 - Kenet Works, Wretch
2007 - Right Media, BlueLithium
2008 FoxyTunes, Maven Networks
In all, Yahoo has injected more than $15 billion in acquisitions in the last ten years and $25 billion in total on all investments and acquisitions over the years. They have made more than 50 acquisitions and investments in total. They have created a great ecosystem; helped consolidate piece parts of the Internet to help drive their growth; and provided many riches for founders and for VC firms alike. We should all be pulling for their success.
