Google Buys Postini
Google has made yet another acquisition (this is number 20 in 2007), and it's one of the biggest yet.
On Monday, Google announced it was buying out anti-spam company, Postini. Widely used by corporations, Postini is one of the three large anti-spam players in the marketplace. Analysts believe this acquisition will strengthen the enterprise anti-spam capabilities to better compete with Microsoft.
Analysts estimate that Postini's revenue in the $40 - $50 million range, which suggests that Google paid a high premium with its $625 million cash offer.
Personally, I think this acquisition is less about fighting spam and more about bolstering Google’s suite of office applications designed to compete with Microsoft Office.
Comments
I think this goes to show the importance of online security. Google will now be able to take on Microsoft for business email accounts.
Posted by: Cap | July 11, 2007 7:47 PM
It's pretty likely that both P&G and GE (current users of Google Apps) informed Google that to move away from MS Office & Exchange, other services would have to be built in to the overall Google offering.
Let's look at what they also include; recent acquisitions, by Google, in brackets:
[a] Security (GreenBorder Tech),
[b] Anti-virus,
[c] Back-up/archiving,
[d] Web conferencing (Marratech),
[e] Presentations (Tonic Systems, Zenter).
It's quite clear, MS Office & Exchange are what Google's gunning for -- but as an intergrated Web services (Google Apps) model.
Posted by: Darcy Kelley | August 8, 2007 3:15 PM