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Groupon shuns Google's $6bn takeover bonanza

What? You want my kids to starve, is that it?

Groupon walked away from acquisition talks with Google late last week, after speculative reports suggested that the world’s largest ad broker was willing to splurge up to $6bn to buy the e-commerce coupon outfit.

According to the Chicago Tribune, which cited sources familiar with the matter, Groupon turned its back on Google choosing instead to stay independent.

It’s understood that Groupon, which expects sales of at least $500m this year, may pursue an initial public offering in early 2011.

Bloomberg reckoned that Groupon's decision to reject Google’s takeover approach also shows that it could be holding out for an even bigger valuation of its website property.

The Chicago-based company failed to agree a $2bn-$3bn takeover deal from Yahoo! when the web portal was sniffing around the site earlier this year.

Facebook famously rejected an offer from Yahoo! in 2006, and the holdout paid off for Mark Zuckerberg’s social network. It remains to be seen if Groupon, which has 35 million users and 3,000 staff worldwide, can push up its valuation by being very picky indeed about the price tag. ®

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