FTC looking into Google's AdMob acquisition

Thursday, December 24, 2009


WASHINGTON (AFP) - – Web search and advertising giant Google said Wednesday that the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is seeking more information about its proposed purchase of mobile advertising company AdMob.

Paul Feng, a group product manager at Google, said in a blog post that the Mountain View, California-based Google had received a "second request" for information from the FTC about the 750-million-dollar acquisition of AdMob.

"As we said when we announced the deal, we don't see any regulatory issues with this deal, because the rapidly growing mobile advertising space is highly competitive with more than a dozen mobile ad networks," Feng said.

"That said, we know that closer scrutiny has been one consequence of Google's success," he said.

"While this means we won't be closing right away, we're confident that the FTC will conclude that the rapidly growing mobile advertising space will remain highly competitive after this deal closes," Feng said.

"We'll be working closely and cooperatively with (the FTC) as they continue their review," he added.

Google announced plans to acquire AdMob last month.

The Web titan hopes AdMob will help it more effectively extend its lucrative Internet advertising domain into the booming world of mobile devices.

AdMob was founded in 2006 by Omar Hamoui as a California technology startup focused on building tools that let Web advertisers follow potential customers on to mobile devices.

Google has previously drawn scrutiny from US antitrust regulators.

Earlier this year, Google was forced to revise its legal settlement with authors and publishers over its digital book-scanning project amid objections from the US Justice Department.

Last year, Google was forced to abandon a proposed advertising agreement with Yahoo! amid Justice Department antitrust concerns.



source:http://asia.news.yahoo.com/afp/20091224/ttc-us-it-company-advertising-internet-t-0de2eff.html


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