Hertz counters Avis's offer for Dollar

Hertz Global Holdings, the largest publicly traded car-rentalcompany, offered to buy Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group for $2.24billion in cash and stock, countering a bid by Avis Budget Group.

Hertz offered $72 a share, 24 percent more than Avis's offer, thePark Ridge, N.J.-based company said Monday in a statement. It valuedthe offer at $2.24 billion for outstanding shares, options andrestricted stock units.

Hertz aims to thwart the planned combination of Avis and DollarThrifty after having an earlier offer rejected. Since then,Parsippany, N.J.-based Avis and Tulsa-based Dollar Thrifty have beenseeking Federal Trade Commission approval for a deal that wouldcombine the third- and fourth-largest U.S. car-rental companies.

Hertz said it decided to act after listening to Dollar Thrifty'sand Avis's conference calls last week discussing their quarterlyearnings and hearing little advancement with regulators.

"The timing was right for us to jump in and push through, giventhe lack of progress over what was happening with the FTC," chiefexecutive Mark Frissora said Monday in a conference call withanalysts and investors. Hertz has been "waiting and watching for along time." A deal may close by Sept. 30, he said.

Groupon and LiveNation, the parent company of Ticketmaster, haveteamed up to offer deals on concerts, sports events and other liveattractions.

The companies have launched a joint initiative, GrouponLive,which will be a localized platform for LiveNation events. Thepartnership is scheduled to begin this summer.

"GrouponLive represents a new channel to drive value for fans,while helping artists and others to reach ever larger audiences,"Michael Rapino, Live Nation Entertainment president and chiefexecutive, said in a statement. "By adding this channel to ourticketing platform, we will also provide our venue partners withanother option for driving ticket sales across a wide range ofevents."

The deal also expands what Groupon offers - restaurant, event andbusiness deals, but not coupons for live events.

Microsoft is close to an agreement to buy Skype Technologies formore than $7 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported, citingunidentified people familiar with the matter.

An accord may be announced as early as Tuesday, though the dealmay still fall apart, the Journal reported.

The report said representatives for Microsoft and Skype declinedto comment.

The purchase amount would make Skype among Microsoft's largestacquisitions in its 36-year history, the report said. Microsoftchief executive Steve Ballmer sees the Internet as an essentialbattleground for Microsoft, which still makes the majority of itsprofits from Windows and Office software systems, the report said.

In 2007, Microsoft paid about $6 billion to buy onlineadvertising firm aQuantive and gave up on an unsolicited $48 billionoffer for Yahoo almost three years ago, the Journal reported. Yahoois valued at half that sum today.

Skype connects more than 663 million users worldwide via Internet-based telephony and video, the report said.

Professional networking Web site LinkedIn hopes to sell its stockfor $32 to $35 per share in an upcoming initial public offering. ItsIPO may encourage other growing Internet services to make theirstock market debuts during the next year.

Based on the IPO's price target, set in a filing Monday with theSecurities and Exchange Commission, LinkedIn would have a marketvalue of $3 billion to $3.3 billion.

The company's debut could offer a preview of investor demand forother popular online services that connect people with commoninterests. Although they haven't set timetables, Facebook, Twitter,the online deals site Groupon and the game maker Zynga are among theother social-networking services expected to go public.

LinkedIn said the offering could raise up to $274 million,including the cash that would go to existing shareholders who areselling part of their stakes in the IPO.