WSJ: Yahoo In Talks To Buy Online Video Service NDN

(RTTNews) - Internet giant Yahoo, Inc. (YHOO) is in preliminary talks to buy online-video service News Distribution Network Inc. or NDN for about $300 million, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday, citing two people who have been briefed on the matter.

An acquisition of NDN would enable Yahoo to compete with Google Inc.'s (GOOG) YouTube and also bolster its online video advertising business. Yahoo's chief executive officer Marissa Mayer has been striving to attract advertisers away from bigger rival Google and others, but financial results for the company's recent fourth-quarter have shown that it is no easy ride.

Mayer has ramped up the Yahoo homepage, made acquisitions and is keen to tap the potential for mobile technology. Yahoo also plans to invest further in technology and video offerings.

An acquisition of NDN for $300 million would be Mayer's second largest deal at Yahoo, after the company paid $1.1 billion for Tumblr in 2013.

NDN is an Atlanta-based video syndication service that reportedly supplies newspapers and other Web publishers with clips about news, sports, politics and other topics.

NDN was founded in 2007 by Greg Peters, a former executive of AT&T. NDN does not make any of its own videos, but has a collection of over 100,000 videos that it makes available to sites such as Bloomberg, the Los Angeles Times and New York Daily News.

NDN's investors are said to include Google Chairman Eric Schmidt, actor Bill Murray and Hall of Fame baseball player Reggie Jackson. The company is the fourth-largest video property in the U.S., according to comScore's ranking of top online video properties.

According to the WSJ report, Yahoo first explored an acquisition of NDN before Mayer took over as its chief executive in 2012, but no deal was reached at that time. However, Yahoo has renewed talks with NDN in recent weeks.

Yahoo had also tried to acquire a stake in French video site Dailymotion and attempted to buy TV portal owner Hulu. But both deals did not materialize.

YHOO closed Monday's trading at $35.90 on a volume of 15.15 million shares.