It is now official. AOL is buying Quigo, a contextual ad network, for a reported $340 million, about the same as Yahoo paid for BlueLithium. We noted speculation about the deal last week. Quigo will become part of Platform-A(OL), the attempted reinvention of of the business as a cross-Web advertising network. Platform-A is a mish-mosh of advertising acquisitions, including Advertising.com, Tacoda, Third Screen Media, Lightningcast, and Adtech. Maybe they should change the name to Platform-A-to-Q.
(Disclosure: I am a former employee of Time Warner, which is the parent of AOL, and I own Time Warner stock.)