Google Acquires Woodbury Company’s Technology, Patents

Woodbury-based Internet technology developer Northbrook Digital, LLC, announced Monday that all of its technology and patent assets have been sold to a third party, believed to be Google.

Mark Wolfe, Northbrook Digital's CEO, would not disclose the buyer. Google officials did not return an email seeing comment.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office website shows that Northbrook has assigned about a dozen patents and patent applications to Google, according to a Pioneer Press story.

Wolfe would not discuss details of the technology that was purchased with Patch, but in a release said his company was founded in the late 1990s and specialized in “developing innovations in Web browsing technology and online advertising.”

"Northbrook Digital developed a number of different web browsing technologies that are becoming essential to today's Web, and recent acquisition interest from multiple parties highlights how important that technology has become," Wolfe said in a statement.

When founded, Northbrook Digital developed technology underlying one of the first web browser toolbars to be integrated into Microsoft's Internet Explorer. More recently, the company concentrated on online advertising and social tagging on the Web.

Wolfe said he has lived in Woodbury for 15-16 years and has been a youth baseball coach for the past 5-6 years.

The purchase included more than a dozen U.S. patents and numerous patent applications, according to the release.