|
Google has walked away from acquiring Santa Clara company, Olive Software.
We wrote earlier that Google was negotiating to buy Olive for $70-80M, to gain access to Olive's technology that helps transfer off-line content into a form where Google can search it (Olive converts PDF documents, microfilm and any other files to XML).
Turns out, Google has passed. Though the story is a bit strange, based on the accounts of two independent sources:
Google sent out a team of 15 people to Olive's Israeli offices (much of the company is over there) for over a week (staying at an expensive hotel), and interviewed each Olive person several times both in person and by phone interviews.
Google also sent a few Olive people abroad (England and US) for interviews because the Google people who needed to interview them hadn't gone to Israel.
It all seemed like a 'go,' but then the Google team suddenly decided the product didn't have everything they wanted. So why, one person close to the deal asked, did Google invest so much time and effort into the people, when it turns out they hadn't fully checked out the product first?
Is Google turning into a Microsoft? Checking out the goods, and then going back and building it themselves? Or hiring away the better employees? Here's what one person said: "Google learned a LOT about Olive... everything."
We actually don't know, and so no point reading too much into it. But we'll follow this one. Meanwhile, Google is opening up two centers in Israel (one in Haifa and one in Tel Aviv). The deal could have given Google a great base.