Which company acquired Netscape in 1998 for $4.2 billion? AOL, formally America Online. On November 24, 1998, AOL announced that it would acquire Netscape Communications in a tax-free stock swap valued at about US$4.2 billion. Netscape was best known for its pioneering Netscape Navigator browser and its role in the early commercial web.
The transaction was announced in the aftermath of the browser wars, when Netscape faced intense competition from Microsoft Internet Explorer. Although the announcement value was $4.2 billion, the deal’s value rose substantially by the time it closed on March 17, 1999, because it was paid in AOL stock.
Sun Microsystems was involved in the later Sun–Netscape Alliance, which covered joint software development and marketing, but Sun did not acquire Netscape. Yahoo and Microsoft were also major internet companies of the era, yet neither bought Netscape. The AOL merger ultimately connected Netscape to the much larger AOL Time Warner story.