| |
The recent report by Reuters Apollo Global Management Incorporation is near to purchase the media assets of Verizon Communications Inc in a deal. If finalizing could be valued at close to $5 billion, the deal stated by the people who know about the matter.
Verizon Communications Inc. is working on an agreement to purchase its media division to Apollo Global Management Inc. it would be a move that would jettison once-dominant online brands like AOL and Yahoo.
This deal could be announced as soon as Monday, stated by the spokesperson, who asked not to be identified, as until now the matter isn’t announced publicly, Verizon will keep a stake in the business.
No final decision has been made and discussions could fall through.
Verizon and Apollo refused to comment further on any Xof the details to be revealed.
With the implied sale, Verizon would unload pieces of an ambitious but distracting foray into online advertising. In 2020, the telecom giant agreed to sell the HuffPost online news service to BuzzFeed Inc, and back in 2019, it sold the blogging platform Tumblr. And its major priority is a wireless business and the construction of a multibillion-dollar network for advanced 5G services and more.
Verizon’s investments in digital advertising never really paid off. In 2015, it acquired AOL for $4.4 billion. That time Tim Armstrong, head of AOL said- he wanted to build a house of brands at Verizon under a division dubbed Oath. Later, in 2017, it bought Yahoo’s internet properties for about $4.5 billion, betting its 1 billion+ users would be a rich audience for online advertisements.
In 2018, after Hans Vestberg took over as Verizon’s chief executive officer, the firm wrote off more than $4 billion of its media holdings and renamed the division Verizon Media Group. It has more than a dozen online brands. It involves Ryot, Built By Girls, Flurry, TechCrunch, and more.
