New York – Microsoft is considering a $2 billion price tag for online advertising firm DoubleClick, reports the Wall Street Journal.  The company, founded in 1996 and taken private in 2005 for $1.1 billion by San Francisco-based private equity firm Hellman & Friedman, had approximately $150 million in revenue last year.

According to sources, DoubleClick has hired investment bank Morgan Stanley to “help sound out its options.”  Among the options is a possible stock market listing.

DoubleClick offers advertisers and publishers delivery, management, and online measurement services.  Citing an unnamed source, the WSJ said, “More than $100 million (of DoubleClick’s revenue last year) came from serving ads for publishers to their Web pages and delivering the ads to be served on behalf of advertisers.”

The UK-based news service The Register questioned the deal, saying, “But what's in it for Microsoft? Surely the company could find a cheaper way to build or buy some ad-serving software. And paying $2bn to replace Atlas GMT, Microsoft's current ad-serving software of choice, for an inhouse service looks somewhat eccentric."

Related Links:
http://tinyurl.com/2m5tnj (WSJ)http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/03/28/microsoft_double_click/ (The Register)