FourEyesSquad

Today, the market is increasingly dominated by one player who is consolidating its dominance through acquisition. Together, Microsoft and Yahoo! can offer a credible alternative for consumers, advertisers, and publishers.

- Steve Ballmer, CEO, in a letter to Yahoo’s board

Familiar much?

The past year we’ve seen (and feared) the growth of the search giant that is Google while it acquires one budding startup IT company whose product compliments Google’s after the other. It seems that everyone must do their best to please Google otherwise it’ll put its axe on the webmasters’ heads.

Microsoft’s MSN and Yahoo have been tailing Google for several years now and it sees that they just couldn’t get ahead. So what to do? Microsoft finally gave an offer to Yahoo’s board of directors — the proposal sent represents $31 per share (a 62% premium over yesterday’s closing price) or about $44.6 Billion. Steve Ballmer, CEO and big fan of developers, says, “We have great respect for Yahoo!, and together we can offer an increasingly exciting set of solutions for consumers, publishers and advertisers while becoming better positioned to compete in the online services market.”

The deal, of course, rests with the two coming to a “merger agreement” and Microsoft (and Yahoo to a limited degree) having the time to conduct the required due diligence. If Yahoo accepts, will this finally be the Google killer?