The group's director, Jamie Love, said its opposition stems in part from the market for Internet software - generally split between Netscape and Microsoft - already being too concentrated. will distribute Netscape's business-level 'server' software, and AOL will use Sun's Java programming technology - which lets programs run on a variety of types of computers - to offer AOL services on what the company called 'next-generation Internet devices.'Ī Washington public-interest group run by Ralph Nader, the Consumer Project on Technology, promised to protest any AOL-Netscape deal. In a three-year deal, Sun Microsystems Inc. In exchange, AOL gets Netscape's browser, and its burgeoning Netcenter Web portal, or jumping off point for Web users. 45 shares of AOL stock for one share of Netscape stock, which, at current market values, pays Netscape shareholders about 40 dollars per share. The $4.21 billion deal, struck late Monday, calls for an exchange of. AOL accounts for 14 million of those, and Netscape's Netcenter on any one day garners 20 million users or more.

The deal merges the World Wide Web's largest network with the company that makes a popular Web browsing software and publishes one of the most popular Web 'portals.'Īccording to recent figures, there are 50 million Web users in the United States. 'What you're witnessing is the birth of an NBC on the Internet.' 'This is massive,' said Ira Machefsky, a research partner at the Palo Alto-based Odeon Capital venture capital company. In a side agreement, AOL will license Netscape corporate software to Palo Alto-based Sun Microsystems Inc. 'The acquisition of Netscape is a big step forward for America Online that will greatly accelerate our business momentum,' AOL Chairman Steve Case said.

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