GROUPON FILES $750 MILLION IPO WITH SEC

On Thursday, Groupon, the popular location-based coupon service, filed for an initial public offering with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The start-up, which alerts 83 million email subscribers in 43 different countries of local deals that range from restaurant discounts to sailing lessons, hopes to raise $750 million in its IPO. “Expect us to make ambitious bets on our future that distract us from our current business,” Andrew Mason, Groupon’s chief executive officer, said in a statement. “Some bets we’ll get right, and others we’ll get wrong, but we think it’s the only way to continuously build disruptive products,” Mason added.

Groupon launched in November, 2007, has more than 7,000 employees, and reported $645 million in revenues during Q1 2011, however they have never made a profit.

GOOGLE LOOKING FOR GROUPON CLONE TO BUY

When it comes to the online coupon space, Google wants in. The Internet giant wants in so badly, it was willing to pay $6 billion for the current market leader, Groupon. The huge offer was actually pretty fair considering Groupon’s reported $1 billion in annual revenue, but the deal died on the table and now Google is left searching for other ways to enter the space. According to a report from the New York Post on Tuesday, the company is doing just that — Google is currently on the prowl for a “Groupon wannabe” to snatch up so it can compete with the company that rejected its advances. Google tends to get what it wants, so an acquisition is bound to happen soon — and that’s good news for consumers. Stiffer competition means more deals, and thus more savings for users of these trendy new local deal vendors. [BGR]