armstrong

By Kristen Schweizer March 10 (Bloomberg) — AOL Inc. said it’s “laser focused” on getting a share of an estimated $20 billion gap in online advertising, as marketers race to catch up with consumers on the Internet. “Consumers have shifted faster than ad dollars,” Tim Armstrong , chief executive officer of the Internet company spun off from Time Warner Inc. , said in an interview today. “We’re building programs with both technology and design for advertising that are focused at closing that gap.” The company currently gets about 50 percent of revenue from ads and is “significantly” boosting sales staff, he said. AOL’s acquisitions strategy is focused on purchasing “technology tuck-ins” to help AOL build its platforms, Armstrong said in the interview in Abu Dhabi. It’s also targeting video and mobile-phone content and is hiring journalists to create quality content, Armstrong said. AOL, which runs MapQuest, PoliticsDaily and Lemondrop.com, will take a total charge of between $150 million and $200 million for a current program of job cuts and office closures, Armstrong said. AOL plans to re-enter some of the international markets it left in 2011 and 2012, he said. AOL , spun off last year, is cutting about a third of its workforce and halving its international offices to leave 20, Armstrong said. The New York-based company gets about 25 percent of revenue overseas, he said. Some international offices were very unprofitable and made acquisitions that didn’t fit with AOL’s strategy, he said. Asset Disposals “Each country had its own platform and even its own country strategy,” Armstrong said. “We’ve gone through and pulled back. We’ll scale the technology based on AOL ’s new business models, which will be customized locally, and we’ll structure hiring that will match our business strategy.” “International is a very critical part of AOL’s future and we’re pulling back to get our plumbing straightened out. We’ll come back with a content platform we believe works globally.” AOL plans to dispose of more assets in 2010, Armstrong said. He declined to say which companies may be sold. AOL last month said fourth-quarter net income was $1.4 million, compared with a loss of $1.96 billion a year earlier, when Time Warner wrote down the value of its Internet property. Revenue dropped 17 percent to $809.7 million. Time Warner spun off AOL in December, nine years after a $124 billion combination that triggered record losses . To contact the reporter on this story: Kristen Schweizer at kschweizer1@bloomberg.net