Microsoft to buy Fast Search for $1.2 billion

January 14, 2008 at 8:02 pm | In IT, Information Technology, Media, Microsoft, Search Engine, Technology, Web, Web 2.0, Wikipedia | Leave a Comment

Microsoft Corp. said Tuesday it will pay about $1.2 billion to acquire Oslo, Norway-based Fast Search & Transfer as part of a move to expand its data-search business in the corporate market.

The Norwegian software developer, founded in 1997, develops technologies used by business customers to search their databases, although Fast Search has lately branched out into the field of online advertising.

Microsoft has been beefing up its search and online advertising capabilities to better compete with Google and Yahoo, although the Fast Search deal is unlikely to help the company in the consumer online market, analyst Brent Williams of The Benchmark Company told clients. He viewed the move as a “tuck-in deal rather than as a game-changing acquisition.”

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