The quickly growing music social network Last.fm has been acquired by CBS for $280 million in an all-cash deal.
UK based Last.fm launched five years ago and has become a social networking favorite with 15 million active users. It has become a massive repository for music information (artist and song wikis, listening data from users, etc.). In the U.S., companies like Pandora, MOG and iLike all compete with some of Last.fm’s features, although none of those startups has built the basic social network/community of last.fm.
The deal sees Last.fm’s management team staying in place and the site maintaining a separate identity.
Last.fm has been an attractive takeover target for some time. CBS as a buyer though is surprising and is a sure sign that the media giant is getting serious about Web 2.0. CBS acquired video blog WallStrip for $5 million earlier this month, and has been on a bit of a buying spree lately after filling out the management team on the interactive side of the business last year.
Previous TechCrunch coverage here.
This certainly explains why Last.fm was a little slow to jump on the Facebook Applications bandwagon last week – they were understandably distracted.