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Research In Motion Hoping to Acquire Mobile Advertising Network?

10:11 am on August 21, 2010 | Category: Business, Corporate, Mobile Devices

As BlackBerry sales slump and analysts raise questions about Research In Motion’s future, the company is rumoured to be investigating a foray into the mobile advertising business.

Both Apple and Google, makers of the iPhone and Android mobile operating systems respectively, have already made such a move. Google spent $750 million on the wireless advertising network, AdMob, last November. Two months later, Apple purchased the Quattro Wireless platform and quickly renamed it ‘iAd.’

This week, the Wall Street Journal reported that Research In Motion is in talks with Millennial Media, a Baltimore-based ad network which serves advertisements on its own network of mobile websites and brokers ad sales to third parties. A potential sticking point in these negotiations is price, with Millennial reportedly asking upwards of $400 million for a full acquisition, according to unnamed sources cited by the WSJ.

Acquiring a mobile ad network could open up a new stream of revenue for RIM’s consumer smartphone business, which has lagged behind those of Apple and various Android smartphone manufacturers. What is unclear, however, is how it would make BlackBerry devices more attractive to consumers — the key challenge faced by RIM executives at this point.

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