Everyone is speculating Google’s new crush-Groupon. The deal is not yet in ink but if rumors are to be believed then it should be made public soon.
Groupon, a Swedish born enterprise, was founded in 2008 by Andrew Mason. The concept underlying this venture was to cater to dealers and local sellers by tapping to an online market through the Groupon platform. Groupon got its name by meshing together – ‘group’ and ‘coupon’.
Coming to the much talked about deal between the global giant and Groupon started circulating around the end November 2010. Most of the industry sources have kept hush or anonymous about the financials or verification of the deal itself. The meeting is apparently scheduled for tomorrow.
Google mostly is keen on acquiring this portal because of the scope it opens up for the loyal ‘retailer’ Googler. The price tag labelled on Groupon allegedly reads a staunch $5.3 billion, as reported by Wallstreet Journal’s All Things D. I do think its a tad bit overpriced. Call me a skeptic but Google being the giant force it is and Groupon being a newbie, the amount spoken of spurs up a strong whiff of curiosity. Makes you wonder, when Google recently launched Hotpot, pitted as the ‘Foursquare Killer’ (as cleverly worded by our reader), instead of buying Foursquare – it made its own version. And I think it could do the same with Groupon – customize a concept and make it available for the existing Google users.
How Groupon works!
The mechanism based on which this portal operates is on a ‘daily deal’ offer format. Groupon will declare a particular deal on a product as the deal of the day. In order for this deal to go public, a minimum number of buyers must sign up for it. If not, then the deal does not become available to all. This makes it safe for sellers as well as Groupon, which demands its share from the sellers.
This recent pitch has kept many guessing as to why Google is throwing the moolah in thin air. As I’ve said before the deal is still not in ink, so we’ll have to just wait and watch. What have you sniffed out about this deal? Share your thoughts with me. Drop in your comments below.