bloggingbuyouts

eSolar announced today that it has secured $130 million in funding. The backers are Idealab, Google.org, and Oak Investment Partners.

This will help it in launching the construction of 33MW pre-fabricated solar power plants.
eSolar designed a modular approach for delivering solar energy at lower costs with scalability and rapid deployment. eSolar eliminates the need for costly public projects and replaces it with smaller, modularized pre-fabricated solar plant installations.

The fund will accelerate deployment of these plants and can potentially provide solar power at market prices possibly lower than coal prices without subsidies. They key wording there is the "without subsidies." Subsidies change much of the analysis for these alternative energy plays.

For the last 24 hours or so, rumors that Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) may be looking to place a bid for Research In Motion, Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) have been floating to the top of the M&A bowl. It's easy to note that rumors about RIM happen every week, but what makes this one so different? Many, many things.

Microsoft's recent attention to making its Windows Mobile platform entrenched into the market for handheld Smartphones continues to indicate how highly the company places mobile technology in its future growth strategy. By now, it's pretty obvious that companies like Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT), Microsoft and Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) all believe that the future of the internet is in the mobile customer's hands. Yes, we'll always have wireless-enabled laptop computers, but for those growing masses who want the office in their pocket, small Smartphones and like devices are just now beginning to see widespread popularity. It will blossom into a huge market from here.

Unless the price is just too high, Microsoft's acquisition of the best-known name in mobile computing would allow it to gain a very loyal customer base almost instantly, but the company could not just dump RIM's exclusive software and email "push" capability in favor of its own. Both RIM and Microsoft now have systems to automatically push received email to customers in the mobile field in real-time. They are direct competitors.

By buying its largest competitor in this space, Microsoft would own the market for Smartphone-based applications and push email, ahead of European-based Symbian. Microsoft's only problem: RIM's market cap is nearly $47 billion. But with rumors fueling Google's entry into the wireless space in full force soon, Microsoft may again be forced to act in the endless arm wrestling with the internet search giant.

When Salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM) teamed up with Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) this year, there was more in the air than just the ability of Google's AdWords program to be integrated into Salesforce.com's web-based console for customers. (At least, it was in the air for me.) After Salesforce.com posted a 42% rise in paying customers for the Q2 period last night, one has to wonder if Google has plans to move into that territory -- the lucrative corporate territory it so richly wants to invade.

Google's been on the M&A warpath over the last year, spending billions in stock and cash to acquire firms left and right. YouTube, DoubleClick (pending) and even the latest GrandCentral purchase have been just a few. Still, Google's largest revenue source is web-based advertising meant for consumer eyeballs. Would it love to take this treasure trove and extend it into the corporate buying and transaction arena? In my estimation, yes -- and Salesforce.com's target corporate market makes it a perfect partner. Google knew this when it partnered with the web-based customer relationship management company this year. My take: it wants more.

Will Google pony up billions for Salesforce.com? In terms of history, it's been around for a while and has proved itself a legit contender to installed software-based competitors like Oracle and Microsoft. There's no software at all to install, and any upgrades and changes are done behind the scenes, not with IT departments. This is the way Google operates as well -- just inside of a web browser. Is a buyout in the works behind the scenes? If Google wants to get into the "service providing" business alongside its advertising business and connect even more buyers and sellers, it very well may be.

Google Inc.'s (NASDAQ: GOOG) M&A pursuit continues. Its latest purchase is Zenter, which provides PowerPoint-like presentations online. It's slick software.

Of course, there's lots of buzz that Google wants to take a big chunk of Microsoft' Corp.'s (NASDAQ: MSFT) highly lucrative franchise, Office.

But is that really the case?

I had a chance to interview Robert Hoffer, who is a managing director of Newforth Partners.

"There's no doubt that Google Docs wants to be the Microsoft application killer, but what Google is really buying when they purchase these firms is the talent. And that's the name of the game.

"It's not about just taking 20 year old legacy applications such as spreadsheets, word processors, and PowerPoint and putting these ancient apps into the browser. It's about adding unique features and functionality that take the usage of these apps to the next level -- the level that being online makes uniquely possible, such as file sharing, group editing, publishing, notifications, revision tracking, document archiving, mashups, etc.

"Microsoft's approach -- Microsoft Live -- is going to be hard pressed in the consumer space to compete with Google, but Google is going to be hard pressed to compete in the enterprise space with Microsoft."

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.

Google has agreed to buy DoubleClick for the (let's just say it) outrageous price of $3.1 billion. Has the dotcom boom returned? I remember when DoubleClick, Inc. was cool before, back in 1999. When I graduated from business school, one of my best friends went to work there. She loved her job (which was largely managing the integration of acquisitions, it seemed) but even then the company was in turmoil -- I can remember frequent tales of colleagues and supervisors scattering to go to sexier dotcoms, or bigger, more reliable companies.

And then, about the time my friend left, DoubleClick lost its aging appeal and was a necessary evil. In April 2005, the company fetched $1.1 billion when it was taken private by Hellman & Friedman and JMI Equity. Since then, the firms have sold off bits of DoubleClick here or there for tidy, small profits. A few weeks ago, the whispers began: a bidding war for DoubleClick had begun, with Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) with their paddles raised highest, some said (yikes!) as high as $2 billion.

The return for Hellman & Friedman has been pegged at a whopping 800%, making this a huge success for them at the same time it concerns many web publishers, who can only worry that Google has now truly become all-powerful. Could it be that Google and Microsoft will soon be considered in the same light? Or will Google's good-guy image survive?

I'm sure little companies all over -- and the firms who fund them -- will treat this news with rejoicing, and vie to be the first knocking on Google's door to be the next outrageous sale.