Slashdot Mirror
Closing This Summer: Verizon To Scoop Up AOL For $4.4 Billion
MojoKid writes with this excerpt from Hot Hardware: We learned this weekend that AOL's dial-up business still has over 2 million customers who pay on average just under $21 per month for service. Regardless of how strange that seems to those of us that salivate over the prospects of gigabit Internet, folks are still clinging to 56k modems are adding millions to AOL's bottom line. However, also recall that AOL has a massive digital advertising platform with a heavy focus on the mobile sector and also owns a wealth of popular web destinations including Engadget, TechCrunch, and The Huffington Post. With this in mind, it shouldn't be too surprising that Verizon has offered AOL a marriage proposal. Verizon is acquiring AOL for an estimated $50 per share, which brings the total value of the transaction to $4.4 billion. Here are stories from The New York Times, NBC News, and NPR on the proposed sale, which it's worth noting isn't yet final, and is subject to regulatory approval.
$100 for a 56k modem
Not having to talk to Comcast PRICELESS
Honestly, is AOL worth $4.4 billion? Someone better be doing some proper due diligence on this one.
With annual revenue of $2.5 billion, probably. Seriously, this is something you could have checked out.
After dialup disappeared, AOL had plenty of cash in the bank. So they became a type of venture capital. They bought Huffington Post, Tech Crunch and many others. Since they actually have a lot of web traffic, they started an advertising business.
If you consider that Google and Facebook are essentially ad companies, with ad networks that span far beyond their own website, AOL is another one. Any time you see a video ad on the internet, there's a decent chance it's from AOL (but please use adblock, malware gets into those things).
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Pshhhkkkkkkrrrrkakingkakingkakingtshchchchchchchchcch...
Did I miss something? There is no company called AOL.
Apparently you missed a lot of things. There very much is a a company called AOL Inc which has annual revenues of around $2.3 billion.
Time Warner bought them out like 10 years ago.
It was 15 years ago and you have it backwards. AOL bought Time Warner, not the other way around. AOL shareholders owned 55% of the merged company.
Is Time Warner the one selling off the AOL branch of products?
AOL was spun off from Time Warner six years ago into an independent company.
If so, this is a Time Warner-Verizon deal.
No it isn't. Time-Warner has nothing to do with this deal.
So you're basically just bloviating. Fair enough/
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
AOL is still around because some of us cling to old technologies because they work better. MP3s downloaded from dial up sound warmer than ones downloaded through an ethernet cable. Sometimes it is worth the wait.
I pay for an AOL account. It's for my Mom in rural Montana. I've tried to explain to her that she can use my Dad's local dialup account, use Gmail, and save me $35/month but they just don't grasp that you can share a dialup but keep mail separate.
I got a letter in the mail from her once. Inside was a funny email someone sent her. She printed it out. Put it in an envelope. With a stamp. And mailed it to me.
Hopefully my own children will put me in a home with I get that way.