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List of acquisitions by AOL

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AOL is an internet company founded in 1985 as Quantum Computing Services. Each acquisition is for the respective company in its entirety. The acquisition date listed is the date of the agreement between AOL and the subject of the acquisition. The value of each acquisition is listed in US dollars because AOL is headquartered in the United States. If the value of an acquisition is not listed, then it is undisclosed. As of August 2013, AOL's largest acquisition has been the purchase of Netscape, a web browser company, for US$4.2 billion.

Netscape's browser was dominant, in terms of market share, but it had lost most of its share to Internet Explorer during the first browser war. By the end of 2007, the usage share of Netscape's browsers had fallen from over 90% in the 1990s, to less than 1%. Its second-largest acquisition is the purchase of MapQuest, a web mapping company. From 1999 to 2009, MapQuest had the greatest market share among mapping websites; it has since dropped to second place, behind Google Maps. The majority of the companies acquired by AOL are based in the United States. As of April 2008, AOL has acquired 41 companies. Most of the acquired companies are related to the internet, including several internet service providers and web browsers.

In 2001, AOL merged with Time Warner to become AOL Time Warner. Due to the larger market capitalization of AOL, it gained ascendancy in the merger, with its executives largely displacing Time Warner's despite AOL's far smaller assets and revenues. AOL was spun off as its own independent company from Time Warner in 2009.

Verizon Communications acquired AOL in 2015, and operated it as a separate subsidiary. In 2017, Verizon bought the first Yahoo! Inc. and merged it with AOL, creating the second Yahoo! Inc. The company sold a 90% stake in Yahoo! to Apollo Global Management in 2021, and AOL was placed under Yahoo!’s umbrella.

01Acquisitions

Acquisition date Company Business Country Value (USD) Adjusted (USD) Ref.
May 1994 Redgate Communications Internet service provider USA $35,000,000 $76,000,000
November 1994 BookLink Web browser USA $30,000,000 $65,000,000
30 November 1994 NaviSoft Web server USA , ,
February 1995 Advanced Network and Services Non-Profit USA $35,000,000 $74,000,000
May 1995 Medior User interface design USA , ,
May 1995 WAIS Inc. Search engine technology USA $15,000,000 $32,000,000
1 June 1995 WebCrawler Search engine USA , ,
22 September 1995 Ubique Virtual places ISR $16,981,000 $36,000,000
1 February 1996 Johnson-Grace Data compression USA , ,
6 August 1996 ImagiNation Network Online game USA , ,
25 November 1996 Global Network Navigator Web browser USA , ,
10 November 1997 CompuServe Online service USA $175,000,000 $351,000,000
26 January 1998 Personal Library Software Search engine USA , ,
8 June 1998 Mirabilis Instant messaging ISR $287,000,000 $567,000,000
24 November 1998 Netscape Web browser USA $4,200,000,000 $8,296,000,000
5 April 1999 When.com Web-based calendar USA $225,000,000 $435,000,000
27 May 1999 Moviefone Film database USA $525,000,000 $1,015,000,000
1 June 1999 Nullsoft Media player USA $80,000,000 $155,000,000
1 June 1999 Spinner.com Media player USA $320,000,000 $618,000,000
October 1999 Gateway.net Internet service provider USA $800,000,000 $155,000,000
3 December 1999 Tegic Predictive text USA , ,
22 December 1999 MapQuest Web mapping USA $1,100,000,000 $2,126,000,000
2 September 2000 Quack.com Voiceportal USA $200,000,000 $374,000,000
5 September 2000 iAmaze HTML editor USA , ,
11 January 2001 Time Warner Entertainment USA $183,000,000,000 $332,743,000,000
19 May 2001 InfoInterActive Telecommunications CAN $28,200,000 $51,000,000
27 July 2001 Obongo E-Wallet USA , ,
July 2001 eVoice Telecommunications USA , ,
19 November 2003 Singingfish Audio/Video search engine USA , ,
24 June 2004 Advertising.com Online advertising USA $435,000,000 $741,000,000
3 August 2004 MailBlocks E-mail service provider USA , ,
3 August 2005 Xdrive Online file storage USA , ,
7 August 2005 Wildseed Mobile software USA , ,
5 October 2005 Weblogs, Inc. Weblog network USA , ,
3 November 2005 MusicNow Online music store USA , ,
10 January 2006 Truveo Video search engine USA , ,
17 May 2006 Lightningcast Internet marketing USA , ,
13 August 2006 Userplane Social network service USA , ,
16 August 2006 GameDaily Video game journalism USA , ,
8 November 2006 Relegence Financial services ISR , ,
14 May 2007 Third Screen Media Mobile advertising USA , ,
15 May 2007 Adtech Advertising technology provider DEU , ,
23 July 2007 Tacoda Advertising network USA $285,000,000 $443,000,000
7 November 2007 Yedda Social Search ISR , ,
7 November 2007 Quigo Advertising network USA , ,
5 February 2008 buy.at Affiliate network USA , ,
13 March 2008 Bebo Social network service UK $850,000,000 $1,271,000,000
28 March 2008 Emurse.com Resume creation & Job hunting site USA , ,
14 April 2008 Sphere Web search engine USA , ,
15 August 2008 Socialthing Social Network Aggregator USA , ,
11 June 2009 Patch Media Local search (Internet) USA , ,
11 June 2009 Going Local search (Internet) USA , ,
15 July 2009 MMAFighting.com MMA blog USA , ,
25 January 2010 StudioNow Internet video USA $36,500,000 $54,000,000
31 August 2010 Rally Up mobile applications USA , ,
28 September 2010 5Min Media video syndication ISR $65,000,000 $96,000,000
28 September 2010 TechCrunch Technology blog USA , ,
28 September 2010 Thing Labs mobile applications USA , ,
1 December 2010 Unblab email USA , ,
16 December 2010 Pictela content marketing USA , ,
20 December 2010 About.me social networking USA , ,
31 January 2011 GoViral Online video distribution DEN $96,700,000 $138,000,000
7 February 2011 The Huffington Post news USA $315,000,000 $451,000,000
4 March 2011 Outside.in Local / News USA , ,
15 March 2012 Hipster mobile applications USA , ,
4 December 2012 Buysight Product Level Retargeting USA , ,
13 February 2013 gdgt gadget reviews media outlet USA , ,
7 August 2013 Adap.tv Video advertising USA $405,000,000 $560,000,000
23 January 2014 Gravity Native advertising USA $90,700,000 $123,000,000
6 May 2014 Convertro Attribution (marketing) USA $101,000,000 $137,000,000
21 May 2014 Precision Demand Attribution (marketing) USA $405,000,000 $551,000,000
1 December 2014 Vidible Video management and exchange platform USA $50,000,000 $68,000,000
March 2015 Velos Predictive analytics USA , ,
23 October 2015 Millennial Media Mobile advertising USA $238,000,000 $323,000,000
August 2015 Ashe Avenue Web Development Group USA , ,
31 August 2015 Kanvas Labs mobile applications USA , ,
25 January 2016 AlephD Publisher Analytics France , ,
20 April 2016 RYOT Immersive Media Company and Virtual Content Studio USA , ,
AOL's Silicon Valley branch office
AOL's Silicon Valley branch office
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This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article List of acquisitions by AOL, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.

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