WebProNews

About a month ago - and after a longish period of quiet - Google arranged to acquire video compression specialist On2 for $106.5 million.  More deals may be on the way, as well, since Eric Schmidt implied this week that the search and advertising giant's only getting started.

Google has "begun seriously looking at acquisitions again," Schmidt told The Nikkei.  The cloud computing sector is of particular interest to Schmidt's corporation, as you might have guessed due to its ever-increasing focus on Google Apps and Google Chrome OS.

Then, with respect to the locations of acquisition targets, it doesn't look like Google's limiting itself to America.  Or even its market share strongholds of America and Europe.  Schmidt said, "We think there's a pretty big investment opportunity in Japan."

You can be sure that a lot of emails will make their way from Japan to Mountain View, California as a result of that statement.

Anyway, Google should have plenty of cash as it goes shopping; the corporation's stock is currently trading at 454.95 per share, up almost 84 percent from its 52-week low of 247.30.  Google has a market cap of about $144 billion right now.