It seems that a half billion dollars was not enough. That’s the price Yelp, the local reviews site, was set to fetch on Friday as it entered into late stage negotiations with Google. But last night TechCrunch reported that the deal had fallen apart.
Perhaps news of the imminent deal attracted new bidders to the table, but it’s not yet clear what caused the last minute scuttling.
Yelp actually seemed a good fit at Google, as we wrote on Friday:
The deal would give Google a more compelling platform to host adverts for small businesses. While the search giant already offers a competing service with Google Local, which displays user-generated reviews of businesses on Google Maps, the company has struggled to win over mom-and-pop businesses that do not have a large online presence. . .
Integration with Google would give Yelp a much broader audience, and a source close to the talks said that Yelp would retain its own brand and identity as a subsidiary of Google.
