Yahoogle! Deal Ditched Hours Before DOJ Could Cry Antitrust

New information about the long since abandoned proposal that Google and Yahoo! get-together for a lucrative ad deal has come to light with an attorney associated with the case saying the Mountain View search giant backed out of the deal just three hours before the Department of Justice was due to file an antitrust complaint.

According to ComputerWorld, Sanford Litvack, the attorney who was to act as lead counsel on the antitrust case said in a recent interview that the two companies decided to walk away from the partnership shortly after Department of Justice officials informed them of the plans to file an antitrust complaint.

The Google-Yahoo! deal had been under investigation for months but the two insisted there was no problem with the agreement that had been drawn up and said they would go ahead with it no matter what the Department of Justice said. Google said that the deal was specifically designed to meet government standards. CEO, Eric Schmidt, even went on to say Microsoft was the one pushing the antitrust issue.

Schmidt told reporters back in September that the company believes that a lot of the drama surrounding the antitrust investigation stems from Microsoft, which was apparently “busy helping everyone get upset about these things.” ComputerWorld reports that Litvack also admitted Microsoft (among others) lobbied the department to block the deal, but said that the efforts had no influence on his decision to recommend that DOJ block the deal.

Read the full story on ComputerWorld.