Korean Daum to Aquire U.S. Search Portal Lycos
Daum Communication Corp., Korea's largest Internet portal, announced they would acquire U.S. search portal Lycos.
Daum Communication Corp., Korea's largest Internet portal, made the public announcement on Thursday that it is planning to acquire the American search portal Lycos. To do so, the company is negotiating with Spanish Terra Networks, the mother company of Lycos.
In regards to the conditions of acquirement, the company said, "Nothing concrete has been decided yet." According to U.S. Dow Jones News on Wednesday (local time), the Korean Internet company tentatively agreed with Terra Lycos to take over Lycos for 75 million euros (around W100 billion) and the conditions of acquirement will be set around this week at the earliest. Lycos recorded revenues of US$98 million and net losses of US$24 million last year.
Koo Chang-keun, a researcher at Dongwon Security, however, said, "The American portal industry centered on a few companies such as Google, Yahoo, and MSN, in an oligopolistic form and this greatly reduced Lycos' market share. Not only that, the environment of the American Internet industry is very different from that of Korea. Thus, even if Daum buys Lycos, it would not reap noticeable benefits."
(Kim Ki-hong, darma90@chosun.com ) |
