Microsoft has agreed to buy Multimap, the privately-owned British company for a little more than $50 million.
Multimap is regarded as a pioneer in location-based search services. That means it provides technology and data that allows a mobile phone to be used to search for, say, the restaurants open for business in a certain area.
It also owns a map website aimed at consumers that attracted more than 4 million unique users in the UK last month, according to Nielsen NetRatings, the market researchers.
The figures place the site second in the field in the UK – sandwiched between the market leading Google Maps, which attracted about 11 million users, and the third-placed Google Earth. Microsoft’s current mapping effort, Live Search Maps, languished in a distant fifth place, with about 868,000 users.
The figures show how Microsoft needs to change its game. The acquisition looks like a smart, cost-effective move.
Multimap, which was founded 12 years ago, also supplies online maps for third-party websites, where it counts groups including Ford, Royal Mail and Virgin as clients.
The company is expected to post revenues of about $24 million this year, and made a profit of nearly $1.8 million in 2006. It will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft, as part of the Virtual Earth and Search teams in the software giant's Online Services Group.
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