Facebook Buy AOL Patents for $550 Million from Microsoft

Facebook just bought 650 patents and AOL applications from Microsoft for $ 550 million. This purchase is done just a few weeks after buying Instagram for $ 1 billion.

Previously, Microsoft had purchased AOL patent for $ 1 billion in cash. Microsoft today announced it has only 275 patents from AOL, as 650 patents and other applications was purchased by Facebook on Monday (04/23/2012) local time.

However, Microsoft also said it has a license agreement for those 650 patent.

"The agreement today with Microsoft showed how important this acquisition to Facebook. This is another significant step taken to build a portfolio of intellectual property to protect Facebook for long time," said Ted Ullyot, Facebook lawyers.

AOL Sells 800 Patents to Survive

AOL (America Online Inc.) is global internet service provider company based in New York that are quite popular with their AIM instant message service. Currently AOL is struggling to maintain its existence after its sales shrink in recent years. AOL tried to get a new source income. According to sources from Bloomberg, AOL hired Evercore company to find a buyer or licensee for more than 800 patents owned by AOL.

Since 2009, AOL apart from giant content company, Time Warner. The web company has seen revenue drop by 29 percent. The decrease is presumably due to lower revenues at AOL dial-up service, reportedly, AOL dial-up services revenue fell 18 percent.