Here's How Much We Think Yahoo Paid For Aviate

Last week, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer went on stage at CES and announced an acquisition: a startup called Aviate.

She said Aviate "organize[s] the apps on your phone's home screen according to its best guess at what you need to see right now."

We have a pretty good idea how much Yahoo paid: $75 million to $80 million.

That's from a single source, so take this information with a grain of salt.

However, TechCrunch also reported Yahoo bought Aviate for about $80 million.

At that price, this is a very smart deal for Mayer.

Three reasons:

• $80 million is a rounding error for Yahoo, which has $1.83 billion in cash.
• Consumers are using their phones more than their desktops to connect to the Internet now. Unlike Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Apple, Yahoo doesn't have any deep connection to users on mobile. It has a bunch of apps. Maybe Aviate could be that something deeper.
• The app sounds pretty useful. In a story about the acquisition that also reviewed the app, my colleague Kyle Russell wrote: "The Startup Yahoo Just Bought Turned My Phone Into The Device I've Always Wanted."