Web services giant AOL announced its acquisition of search firm Sphere Source Inc. Financial terms were not disclosed. Sphere provides contextual search tools offering related content to publishers--the three-year-old firm connects content from blogs, video, media, photos and advertisements, displaying results in a pop-over window or an integrated widget that enables publishers to enhance articles by incorporating related articles and blog posts. Sphere's third-party network includes more than 50,000 content publishers and blogs--prior to the acquisition, the company partnered with AOL to offer its widget technology on AOL News and the myAOL service, Mgnet. Sphere will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of AOL under the aegis of its Programming division.
For more on the AOL/Sphere deal:
- read this release [1]
Related articles:
AOL [2] acquires Bebo for $850 million
AOL [3] taps Cellufun for mobile gaming portal
AOL [4] fine-tunes mobile strategy
Verizon inks advertising deal with AOL [5]
Links:
[1] http://www.fiercewireless.com/press-releases/aol-acquires-sphere
[2] http://www.fiercemobilecontent.com/story/aol-acquires-bebo-for-850-million/2008-03-13
[3] http://www.fiercemobilecontent.com/story/aol-taps-cellufun-for-mobile-gaming-portal/2008-03-31
[4] http://www.fiercemobilecontent.com/story/aol-fine-tunes-mobile-strategy/2007-10-23
[5] http://www.fiercemobilecontent.com/story/verizon-debuts-unlimited-smartphone-web-browsing/2008-04-14