Date: 03-17-2008
AOL, dealing with a slew of executive departures and falling subscription sales, has agreed to buy Bebo, the third-largest U.S. social networking website, for a whopping $850 million. The all-cash deal is sure to pep up AOL’s expansion in the online advertising arena. Bebo, which boasts 40 million users worldwide, is relatively small in the U.S., but it is particularly popular in the UK. Randy Falco, chairman and chief executive officer of AOL, said, “Bebo is the perfect complement to AOL’s personal communications network, and puts us in a leading position in social media.” AOL, which has recently had a spate of acquisitions in the ad market, is planning to deploy its new advertising network on Bebo, which offers original programming, including a mystery series called KateModern.
