Here’s a head-shaking blast (or, ballast) from the past on the heels of today’s SEC’s allegations against Mark Cuban and, concomitantly, the planned departure of Jerry Yang over at Yahoo.
I flipped the switch on my Firefox flux capacitor (um, via Google, not Yahoo) and 0.08 seconds later it was 1999, the year Prince was crowned Nostradamus in loosely predicting how the dotcoms would indeed party – devil-may-care and sideways willy-nilly – till that lunar landing IPO or, far more likely, till Rocko, Joey Knuckles and Starving Students arrived to repo the foosballs, Razors and iMacs and padlock the doors on the way out. Conveniently enough, the article’s dated April 1 (no foolin’):
Thursday, April 1, 1999 Published at 21:23 GMT 22:23 UK
Business: The Company File
Yahoo buys Broadcast.com
Yahoo looks likely to spice up its site with audio and video
One of the most popular sites on the Internet, Yahoo, has bought an online company which broa
dcasts everything from presidential speeches to lingerie fashion shows. Yahoo, using its own highly valued shares, is paying $5.7bn (£3.2bn) to acquire Broadcast.com.
Yahoo is the most popular portal site on the Internet, with 50m visitors a month. In simple terms, it is a massive directory of Web sites, akin to a global telephone directory – only this one is considerably larger. Analysts say the buy out of Broadcast.com will enable Yahoo to beef up its text-only services to include audio and video.
Critics say its content has been looking more humdrum compared with what some other sites are offering, and that it has trailed others in offering more varied media. Tim Koogle, chairman of Yahoo, said: “Broadcast.com’s tremendous first-to-market advantage has made it the leading destination on the Web for audio and video broadcasts, and it will provide significant added value to Yahoo’s audience worldwide.”
Yahoo is offering 0.7722 shares of its own stock for one share of Broadcast.com’s stock. Broadcast.com lost $14m on sales of $22m last year.
Smart move
“It will be a pretty neat deal from Yahoo’s perspective,” said Lanny Banker of Salomon Smith Barney. “They are seeking other platforms to distribute content and Broadcast.com is a really tight fit in terms of content, audience and technology.”
Some Internet users cannot easily access the “streaming video” offered on sites like Broadcast.com. To do so, they need broadband or high-speed Internet service. But the number of users who have broadband Internet access is growing fast and makes up a market which analysts say cannot be ignored for long.
Broadcast.com is based in Dallas. An improved use of media is seen as an important way ahead for the Internet. AtHome, which delivers the broadband Internet service enabling consumers to view video online, earlier this year agreed to buy Excite in a deal which will mean more multi-media services on the Internet.
Other Yahoo rivals include Lycos, subject of another takeover bid, and Snap.com, the portal jointly owned by CNET and General Electric, parent company of network television company NBC.
Changing ads
NBC is aggressively gearing up for the growing demand for media enhanced services. Snap recently overhauled its Internet portal to feature video and interactive features. Many advertisers are also seeking ways to place interactive and video promotions on the Internet, which they believe will be vastly more effective than the plain “banner ads” widely used.
As Internet stock prices have soared, acquistions using stock have become easier and more attractive. With its current value approaching $40bn, Yahoo is among the most highly capitalised Internet stocks on the market. Two months ago it bought Geocities, a service that allows people to run home pages online, for $3.7bn. Yahoo shares jumped 11 3/8 to 179 3/4 and Broadcast.com surged 11 13/16 to 130 on the news.
Article available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/309498.stm
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Wow, the future’s exciting! Where do I sign up?! Say, maybe I can find out more about Broadcast.com on YouTube.com. Be right back. Oh, and if I don’t post anything here for a few days it’s probably because I’m deep-diving webisodes of “Will it Blend” to gauge how easily I can frappe a few twine-tied bricks of worthless stock warrants….
Posted by: Colin Mangham