Google buys Doubleclick
In its largest acquisition yet, Google has agreed to pay $3.1 billion in cash for online ad company DoubleClick, the companies announced.
The deal gives Google a large network of advertisers and Web publishers to serve and sell ads to, and it boosts the search giant’s banner advertising business, which lagged rival Yahoo’s.
The acquisition, which is expected to close sometime later this year, also will give media agencies and advertisers the ability to manage integrated search and display ad campaigns through one centralized console, Schmidt said. “The whole system will run faster,” he said. “Users will benefit from more targeted ads.”
Personal Bee’s founder will come in as VP of business development at Technorati; we’re not sure whether the value of the target was in engineering, where Technorati’s been weak. Any significance beyond that? One person familiar with Personal Bee says Technorati — which has in the past offered brand-tracking to marketers, ego-surfing to bloggers and search to ordinary users — plans now to build themed news pages in the style of Techmeme. 
Microsoft’s drive into the health care market is just getting under way, but the company signaled yesterday that one important ingredient in its plan will be a specialized search engine tailored to deliver useful medical information to consumers.
