Internet giant Google has agreed to make a cash offer of 421 million kroner (54.5 million euros, 68.2 million dollars) for Norway’s Global IP Solutions (GIPS), a voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) processing firm, the two groups said on Tuesday.
The offer has already been accepted by about 50 percent of GIPS’ shareholders and is recommended by its board. It is conditional to the acceptance of 90 percent of shareholders, the two companies said in a joint statement.
The offer price of 13 kroner per share represents a premium of 142.1 percent over the closing price of GIPS stock on January 11, when the company announced interest from a strategic buyer.
GIPS, a company headquartered in San Francisco but held by Norwegian investors and listed in Oslo, develops voice and video solutions for an IP network.
“The web is evolving quickly as a development platform, and real-time video and audio communication over the Internet are becoming important new tools for users,” Google’s engineering director Rian Liebenberg said in the statement.
“GIPS’s technology provides high quality, real-time audio and video over an IP network, and we’re looking forward to working with the GIPS team at Google to continue innovating for the Web platform,” he added.
