Below we’ve compiled a comprehensive list of all of the first quarter 2008 mergers and acquisitions in the web, social networking, technology, internet advertising, hardware, software and mapping industries. We’ve tried to provide an overview of the blog/media/press coverage for each acquisition, and we’ve linked to official press releases where available.

Q1 2008 M&A activity picked up where 2007 left off, with strong numbers in the internet & technology sector.

Here’s a few interesting stats that we’ve noticed:

  • The majority of deals were in the $100-$250 Million price range. 
  • The average deal was $215.9 Million in Q1 2008.
  • Of the 22 acquisitions were disclosed, the total value of these deals was $4.75 Billion.

Here’s the breakdown of deals by price:

  • Under $25M: 2 deals
  • $25M - $99M: 5 deals
  • $100M - $250M: 10 deals
  • $250M or more: 5 deals

The trend of more and more acquisitions in the web/internet and social network space continues to lead the way in 2008 with 17 acquisitions taking place thus far. Software acquisitions also appeared strong in Q1. They led the charge in average deal value with an average acquisition price of $288.8 million.

If you know of any mergers or acquisitions that we’ve missed, please leave a comment on this post and we’ll update.

Finally, thanks to all of the great blogs out there (TechCrunch, GigaOm, Mashable, VentureBeat, ReadWriteWeb, and more) whose frequent tracking of acquisitions makes this list possible.

Update: Here is a link to Q1 2009 Web/Internet/Tech Acquisitions, our most recent list.


Web/Internet Companies Acquired in Q1 of 2008

Acquired Acquirer Acquisition cost Details
Moniker Oversee.net $65 Million Moniker is a domain registration and auction powerhouse.
Press Release | TechCrunch
Bodybuilding.com Liberty Media $100 Million Liberty Media acquired a controlling stake in Bobybuilding.com an online retailer and fitness website.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Reuters
CleverSet Art Technology Group (ATG) $10 Million CleverSet offers discovery and recommendation engines to e-commerce sites, using a statistical approach to making products matches.
Press Release | TechCrunch | BNet
Anywhere.FM Imeem Undisclosed Anywhere.FM is a powerful web music player that allows users to upload their music, play it from anywhere, and discover new music through Friend Radio.
Press Release | NY Times | VentureBeat
Audible Amazon $300 Million Audible is the leading provider of audio books in digital form, with a library of 80,000 titles.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Wall Street Journal | VentureBeat
Maven Networks Yahoo $160 Million Maven Networks is a Boston based startup video-hosting platform for media sites.
Press Release | TechCrunch | CenterNetworks | BNet | VentureBeat
FoxyTunes Yahoo Undisclosed FoxyTunes is a Firefox plugin that allows users to control their favorite media players from the browser.
Press Release | TechCrunch
Vehix Comcast Undisclosed Vehix is a multi-platform network that provides car buyers with a one-stop shopping experience.
Press Release | Mashable
HotOrNot Avid Life Media $20 Million HotOrNot is a San Francisco based online photo rating site.
TechCrunch | Wired
Compete Taylor Nelson Sofres $75-150 Million Compete is a provider of analystics, reasearch and business intelligence.
Press Release | TechCrunch | CenterNetworks | VentureBeat
BlogDigger Odeo Undisclosed Blogdigger is a site focused on standard blog searches.
Press Release | TechCrunch | ReadWriteWeb
Auctomatic Communicate $5 Million Auctomatic is a tool for managing your eBay business.
TechCrunch | Mashable | Newsweek
BeInSync Phoenix Technologies $25 Million BeInSync is an Israeli startup that provides software for the synchronization of files across computers and access them while on the road.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Yahoo


Social Networking Companies Acquired in Q1 of 2008

Acquired Acquirer Acquisition cost Details
Prospero Mzinga Undisclosed Prospero Technologies is the leader in customer community solutions.
Press Release | TechCrunch | VentureBeat
Social Platform Onesite Undisclosed Social Platform is a key player in the custom white label social networking software space.
Press Release | GigaOm | Mashable
Pluck Demand Media $75 Million Pluck is a social media software company. Its two main products are SiteLife and BlogBurst.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Mashable
Bebo AOL $850 Million Bebo is one of the worlds most popular social networking sites.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Mashable | VentureBeat


Internet Advertising Companies Acquired in Q1 of 2008

Acquired Acquirer Acquisition cost Details
Sway Cornerworld $30 Million Sway offers customers real-time results tracking and adminitration of marketing campaigns across multiple web 2.0 and social media platforms.
TechCrunch
buy.at AOL $150 Million buy.at is a leading affiliate marketing network.
Press Release | TechCrunch
YaData Microsoft Undisclosed YaData offers analytic software for marketers in the US, including segment discovery and ranking, which combines statistical techniques for segment discovery.
Press Release | TechCrunch
Weblistic Spot Runner Undisclosed Weblistic is a company that helps local businesses run online advertising campagns.
TechCrunch | Mashable | MediaWeek


Software Companies Acquired in Q1 of 2008

Acquired Acquirer Acquisition cost Details
XIV IBM $350 Million XIV is an Israeli based data storage technology company.
Press Release | TechCrunch
Apertio Nokia Siemens $206 Million Apertio is a mobile network management provider.
Press Release | TechCrunch | NY Times
Onaro Network Appliance $120 Million Onaro is a developer of storage-management software.
Press Release | TechCrunch | BNet
MySQL Sun Microsystems $1 Billion MySQL is an open source database startup.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Information Week
Trolltech Nokia $153 Million Trolltech is a platform application development provider.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Engadget | Business Week | VentureBeat
Fraud Sciences eBay (Paypal) $169 Million Fraud Sciences is an Israel and Palto Alto based company that offers automated anti-fraud systems including SpotLight VFX and SpotLight T2T, merchant solutions that provide transaction verification with fraud prevention. Press Release | TechCrunch | Mashable | ITWire | VentureBeat
E-Dialog GSI Commerce $157 Million e-Dialog is a leading provider of advanced email marketing services and solutions.
Press Release | MSN Money | VentureBeat
MessageOne Dell $155 Million MessageOne is an enterprise email management service.
Press Release | TechCrunch | Engadget | VentureBeat


Hardware Companies Acquired in Q1 of 2008

Acquired Acquirer Acquisition cost Details
G-Technology Fabrik Undisclosed G-Technology sells external drives that focus on high performance for rich media.
Press Release | TechCrunch | The Alarm Clock
Danger Microsoft $500 Million Danger is the maker of the Sidekick cell phone.
Press Release | TechCrunch | GigaOm | VentureBeat


Mapping/Geo Companies Acquired in Q1 of 2008

Acquired Acquirer Acquisition cost Details
Caligari Microsoft Undisclosed Caligari makes 3-D modeling and animation software.
Offical Blog Post | TechCrunch | Mashable


A brief disclaimer: We’ve tried hard to ensure that all of the information above is accurate, but it is very likely that we’ve made a few typos and mistakes. If you catch an error, please post a comment and we’ll do our best to research and correct it. We’re not responsible for the accuracy of the above information and it should not be relied upon.

      del.icio.us   SphereIt   Reddit   Furl