On April 14, Google announced a definitive agreement to acquire DoubleClick Inc. for $3.1 billion in cash from San Francisco-based private equity firm Hellman & Friedman along with JMI Equity and management.

Battelle says that "This raises a very important question - why didn't Microsoft match Google's $3.1 billion offer. Smith would not comment on this, but I can report from very good sources that in fact the company did offer to match it, and was willing to pay even more to insure that Google did not corner the online ad market. But for whatever reasons, the private equity firm that owned the majority of DoubleClick's shares decided to go with Google."