06-17-2016, 02:52 PM
(06-17-2016, 02:31 PM)Rasec Wrote: I'm starting to believe this deal was never about a future revenue stream but more a strategic positioning in the AI space without having to go fund a project from scratch (time to market) plus ability to hire the talent that Linkedin already has in house.
I agree. I don't think it was so much about the current revenues or earnings, it was about partnerships and exposure to the business contacts it provides. It sounds like Salesforce was also in the bidding, and as a competitor, I don't imagine that MSFT wanted that merger to happen.
LinkedIn has around 400M members, much less than Facebook, but the demographic of people that use it is much more attractive for a company like MSFT who is trying to grow users of its software and cloud services.