As part of an online advertising push designed to leapfrog Yahoo and present a serious challenge to Google, Microsoft has just closed a $6 billion deal with digital marketing company aQuantive. As the software industry begins a shift from traditional desktop programs to web-based applications, MS fears the disruption could affect all of its products in ways yet unknown; the purchase of aQuantive is designed to help the company stay profitable during the transition period.
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Our goal is to be No. 1 or No. 2," Kevin Johnson, president of Microsoft Corp.'s platforms and services division, said in an interview last week. Johnson added that units in the two companies (MS and aQuantive) are being combined and reorganized to provide an advertising platform to support new Web-based services. A new advertising and publishing solutions group is being formed, under a plan Johnson and aQuantive Chief Executive Brian McAndrews outlined last week with The Associated Press. The group, to be led by McAndrews, includes aQuantive's ad-serving technologies and tools for tracking the success of online ad campaigns, and DrivePM, which extends Microsoft's ability to sell Web ads to aQuantive's broad network of top sites. AQuantive's Avenue A/Razorfish, a well-regarded Web design and online advertising agency, will operate "
at arm's length," McAndrews said.
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