Yahoo’s Bartz Keen On Making Acquisitions

Believe it or not, Yahoo has a market cap of about $22 billion, and the company intends to put some of that money to good use in the near future.  Carol Bartz stated at the Transformation 2010 conference that she intends to acquire more stuff this year.

In response to what could have been a "yes" or "no" question concerning acquisitions in 2010, Bartz answered "absolutely," pretty much guaranteeing that at least one purchase will take place.  Bartz then explained to Abbey Klaassen, "This year it's about what technologies: Do we need to fill in the blanks, what analytics, what tools?"

Bartz also said, "Well just imagine whether it's acquiring an audience - a group of female bloggers, or whether it's acquiring some better analytics tools that help us guide campaigns with our partners, or whether it's technology.  Last year we bought at company called Zoobut, which is better photo technology, so it let us do very modern photos in our mail.  It's that sort of thing - audience, technology and tools."

The next few months should be interesting time for Yahoo, given that Microsoft will soon begin to exert a huge influence over the search side of its operations.  Whatever purchases Bartz is considering could provide a good clue about what area(s) Yahoo will focus on moving forward.

One last note: For the record, Yahoo's stock is moving up in early morning trading, perhaps giving the company a bigger shopping budget.

Google Buys Cloud Photo Editing Service

Google announced today it has acquired Picnik, a cloud-based photo editing service. The company consists of about 20 employees.

"Google processes petabytes of data every day, and with their worldwide infrastructure and world-class team, it is truly the best home we could have found. Under the Google roof we’ll reach more people than ever before, impacting more lives and making more photos more awesome," says Picnik in its announcement.

Picnik lists the following as its features:

- Fix your photos in just one click
- Use advanced controls to fine-tune your results
- Crop, resize, and rotate in real-time
- Tons of special effects, from artsy to fun
- Astoundingly fast, right in your browser
- Awesome fonts and top-quality type tool
- Basketfuls of shapes from hand-picked designers
- Works on Mac, Windows, and Linux
- No download required, nothing to install

The basic version of Picnik is free, but there is a premium version with more features available for $24.95 a year.

"We're not announcing any significant changes to Picnik today, though we'll be working hard on integration and new features," says Google Product Management Director Brian Axe. "As well, we'd like to continue supporting all existing Picnik partners so that users will continue to be able to add their photos from other photo sharing sites, make edits in the cloud and then save and share to all relevant networks."

"We're very impressed with the Picnik team and the product they've created, and we're excited to welcome them to Google," says Axe. "We're looking forward to collaborating closely with them to improve the online photo editing experience on the web. In the meantime, we encourage you to head to Picnik, import some of your photos from Picasa Web Albums, Flickr or Facebook and try your hand at photo editing in the cloud!"

Financial details of the acquisition are unknown at this point. Should Photoshop makers Adobe be worried?

Google Takes Popular Email App from iPhone For Itself

The competition between Google and Apple appears to be getting fiercer by the day. Google has now acquired popular iPhone app reMail, and has discontinued it in Apple's App Store, and most likely offer it in the Android Market (although this has not been confirmed).

reMail was created by a former Google employee, who used to work as a software engineer on Gmail. "Gmail is where my obsession with email started as an engineering intern back in 2004, and I'm thrilled to be coming back to a place with so many familiar faces," Remail creator Gabor Cselle says on his blog. "reMail's goal was reimagine mobile email, and I'm proud we have built a product that so many users find useful."

Although reMail has been removed from Apple's App store, those who have already downloaded will continue to be able to use it. Support will be continued through March.

"We've enabled all paid reMail features for you: You can activate these by clicking 'Restore Purchases' inside the app," explains Cselle. "reMail downloads email directly from your email provider to your phone, and your personal information, passwords, and email are never sent to or stored on our servers."

This week at Mobile World Congress, Google CEO Eric Schmidt stressed the importance of mobile to Google's strategy. This acquisition, which some have considered to be a slap to Apple's face, is only the latest piece in that puzzle. It will be interesting to see if Google goes after any more apps from Apple's store. The company has certainly been in the mood for acquisitions. Just last week, the company acquired social Q&A site Aardvark.

Twitter Puts Pixar’s CFO On Payroll

Twitter's at last found someone to be its chief financial officer, and the man appears to be more than qualified for the position.  Ali Rowghani actually comes to Twitter from Pixar, where he also held the title of CFO.

Pixar is, of course, the popular animation studio responsible for movies like Toy Story, The Incredibles, and WALL-E.  Disney bought it in 2006 for $7.4 billion, and Rowghani was present at the time, having started at Pixar in 2001.

Now, we'll get to see what he can do with one of the Web's more fashionable social sites.  But it's important to note that the company's COO has said Twitter's not going public this year, and it's also been a while since there have been any rumors concerning acquisitions.

Then here's one other interesting point: Rowghani might not be Twitter's biggest fan, since as the screenshot below shows, he's not what anyone would call a heavy user.

Anyway, Rowghani should officially join Twitter in March, according to Reuters, and CEO Evan Williams said that they're all concentrating on "creating value for our users and capturing the financial opportunities that result from it."

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