Todd Teresi has announced over at Yodel Anecdotal that Yahoo! will acquire online global ad network BlueLithium for about $300 million in cash.
According to the announcement, BlueLithium is the fifth largest ad network in the United States and the second largest in the United Kingdom with 145 million unique visitors per month.
Teresi describes the acquisition of this company with over 100 employees as important for making Yahoo! “one of the world’s leading online display ad networks.” Apparently, Yahoo! believes that BlueLithium’s data analytics and behavioral targeting tools will help them get there.
Yahoo!’s acquisition of the company comes less than 5 months after Google acquired DoubleClick and less than 4 months after Microsoft acquired aQuantive, albeit for much larger sums ($3.1 and $6 billion respectively).
BlueLithium was founded in 2004 and named 2006 Innovator of the Year by AlwaysOn. Details are available in Yahoo!’s official press release.