TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington, citing three unnamed sources, said on Thursday night that Google (GOOG) wants to acquire the Internet start-up microblogging service Twitter in cash, stock or a combination of the two. Arrington also said the companies are considering working together on a Google real-time search engine.
Hours after TechCrunch proprietor wrote his blog entry, BoomTown’s Kara Swisher reported on her own blog that the story “while certainly sounds exciting, it isn’t accurate in any way, according to a number of sources BoomTown spoke to close to the situation.”
“In fact, Twitter and Google have simply been engaged in ‘some product-related discussions,’ according to one source,” Swisher wrote.
On Friday however, Arrington indirectly insisting on the reliability of his sources updated the Google/Twitter talk-subject, saying:
New sources say that Google is interested in acquiring Twitter, and has had talks with the company about a deal. Google’s internal valuation, however, would value the company at a token premium above Twitter’s last round of financing valuation, around $250 million. Some Twitter insiders want the deal, but our sources say CEO Evan Williams wouldn’t sell even for $1 billion. “He may blink, but he wouldn’t do it,” said one source. [via TechCrunch]
Will be interesting to see who will win this reliability source context.
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I know it will be hard to resist the big CASH and stock offer from Google, but I would love to see Twitter stay independent and uncorrupted. That being said if I owned Twitter and got offered that much….. Well you can’t blame them if they sell out.
Ralph DeLuca
Madison, NJ