From Live Search’s official blog:

We’re excited to announce that we’ve reached an agreement to acquire Powerset, a San Francisco-based search and natural language company.

Powerset will join our core Search Relevance team, remaining intact in San Francisco. Powerset brings with it natural language technology that nicely complements other natural language processing technologies we have in Microsoft Research.

More importantly, Powerset brings to Live Search a set of talented engineers and computational linguists in downtown San Francisco. This is a great team with a wide range of experience from other search engines and research organizations like PARC (formerly Xerox PARC).

(read more…)

REDMOND, Wash. — June 17, 2008 — Microsoft Corp. today announced the acquisition of Navic Networks, a leading provider of television advertising solutions. Navic’s technologies include sophisticated campaign management tools that use relevant data to optimize the delivery and placement of targeted interactive television media and through Admira provide a unified ad network for targeting audiences across television advertising inventory. With the addition of Navic solutions, Microsoft’s comprehensive advertising platform will be able to facilitate enhanced digital advertising across online and offline environments.
(full press release…)

Microsoft - http://www.microsoft.com/
Navic Networks - http://www.navic.tv/

This is more a media M&A but I’m including it here because CNET covers the technology industry…

NEW YORK and SAN FRANCISCO, May 15 — CBS Corporation (NYSE: CBS.A and CBS) has entered into an agreement to acquire CNET Networks, Inc. (Nasdaq: CNET), it was announced today by Leslie Moonves, President and Chief Executive Officer, CBS Corporation. Under the terms of the agreement, CBS will make a cash tender offer for all issued and outstanding shares of CNET Networks for $11.50 per share, representing an equity value of approximately $1.8 billion. The acquisition will make CBS one of the 10 most popular Internet companies in the United States, with a combined 54 million unique users per month, and approximately 200 million users worldwide.
(full press release)

CBS - http://www.cbscorporation.com/
CNET - http://www.cnet.com/

Updated: See coverage on TechCrunch:
- CNET CEO: “This Is An Exciting Day For Us”
- Why CBS Bought CNET, And Not The Other Way Around

PALO ALTO, Calif., and PLANO, Texas, May 13, 2008 — HP and EDS today announced that they have signed a definitive agreement under which HP will purchase EDS at a price of $25.00 per share, or an enterprise value of approximately $13.9 billion. The terms of the transaction have been unanimously approved by the HP and EDS boards of directors.

The transaction is expected to close in the second half of calendar year 2008 and to more than double HP’s services revenue, which amounted to $16.6 billion in fiscal 2007. The companies’ collective services businesses, as of the end of each company’s 2007 fiscal year, had annual revenues of more than $38 billion and 210,000 employees, doing business in more than 80 countries.
(official press release)

HP - http://www.hp.com/
EDS - http://www.eds.com/

According to a NYTimes.com article, HP is offering to buy EDS for $12.6 billion in cash. HP is clearly trying to catch up to IBM in the game of IT services for large corporations, an area where IBM certainly has a commanding lead. A combination would lead to some serious integration issues. The two companies today have over 310,000 employees together. However, in trying to move further away from the PC business, this could make sense for HP. We’ll see where it leads to…

After not being able to reach an agreement on the price and other terms, the negotiation fell apart and Microsoft is now withdrawing its offer to buy Yahoo! (Reportedly, Microsoft’s final offer was $33 a share while Yahoo wanted at least $37.) See Microsoft’s official press release here. Yahoo’s official response is here.

Personally this is the outcome that I’ve wanted to see the most — Microsoft leaves Yahoo alone and Yahoo can remain an independent company. However, this is probably not the end of all this. Yahoo’s share price is sure to drop comes Monday. Microsoft can either buy them in the open market or makes another (and lower) offer later on. I, for one, have never really seen why Microsoft really needs Yahoo or Yahoo is better off with them. But a lot of people seem to think so and it’s hard to imagine that Microsoft is walking away this easily…

Let’s wait and see what happens… Now the acquisition threat is gone (temporarily), would Yahoo still outsource search advertising to Google? Will Microsoft come back with another offer later on? Boy, the suspense….

Updated: NYTimes.com’s Dealbook has a very good chronology here.

See the official announcement on Farecast’s blog. (No official press release from Microsoft though.)

New York, NY, April 15, 2008 – AOL today announced that it has acquired Sphere Source, Inc., a leading provider of contextual-search tools which offers related content to publishers. Sphere will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of AOL as part of the company’s Programming division, which is led by Executive Vice President Bill Wilson.
(full press release)

AOL - htto://www.aol.com/
Sphere - http://www.sphere.com/

SUNNYVALE, Calif., Apr 09, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO), a leading global Internet company, today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire substantially all of the assets of Tensa Kft., more commonly known as IndexTools, a leading provider of Web analytics software for online marketing. The acquisition includes IndexTools’ Web analytics business and technology as well as its Tensa R&D Kft. subsidiary. Upon completion of the acquisition, the addition of the IndexTools’ assets is intended to expand Yahoo!’s powerful set of services designed to maximize its clients’ online marketing efforts.
(full press release)

Yahoo - http://www.yahoo.com/
IndexTools - http://www.indextools.com/

HOPKINTON, Mass. and SAN DIEGO, Calif. - April 8, 2008
EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC), the world leader in information infrastructure solutions, and Iomega Corporation (NYSE: IOM), a global leader in data storage and protection for consumers and small businesses, today announced a definitive agreement for EMC to acquire San Diego-based Iomega in a cash tender offer of $3.85 per outstanding share, or approximately $213 million. The addition of Iomega’s products, brand name, route to market and industry expertise will enhance EMC’s reach and focus in the rapidly-growing consumer and small business markets.
(full press release)

EMC - http://www.emc.com/
Iomega - http://www.iomega.com/