Without doubt my favourite headline last week, but the story behind it was probably not a big hit in the headquarters of Fast Search and Transfer who was served a hefty fine of roughly £100,000 (NOK 1.110.220 kroner) for not informing Oslo Stock Exchange (OSE) about Microsoft's bid for the company.
According to OSE, Fast should have disclosed that it was being courted by the IT-Giant by 7 November 2007 at the latest, when the sales negotiations were formalised with a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA).
However, that Microsoft was in the process of acquiring Fast, clearly price sensitive information according to OSE, was not made public until 8 January 2008. Hence the fine, and the headline – which strictly speaking I guess should have been "Fined for flirting with Ballmer." After the acquisition of Fast was completed on Friday, Microsoft's CEO paid a secret visit to Oslo on Saturday to reassure Fast's employees about their future roles in the company. He was greeted by Digi.no and Anders Brenna, who recorded the visit for posterity here.
Detail from picture by Anders Brenna.
Of course, the headline isn't all that great from a SEO-point of view, but that's another matter...
Wow, they are really strict...but still it's like peanuts to them. Is it the first Microsoft is buying a company in the region ?
Posted by: JD | April 28, 2008 at 11:43 AM
As far as I can remember, yes, but don't quote me on it, follow the link to Brenna's blog and ask him:-)
Posted by: Kristine | April 29, 2008 at 07:07 AM