AOL is thinking big, and hopefully thinking right. The company recently announced two acquisitions; Patch, which is basically designed to bring local news, crisp and clear to people, and Going, which will basically help people find things to do in their areas.

Going forward, Tim Armstrong of AOL said that Patch will largely be their focus, since that is an area which AOL can leverage on with the huge audience that it already has.

Tim Armstrong’s company Polar Capital Group was also one of the first to invest in Patch and is somehow the only company listed on Patch’s website. So, I do see some corporate favouritism going on here.

Says Tim:

Polar invested in Patch because Tim believes that Patch should be in every community in America, and wants Patch in his town. He wants to read local news stories done by journalists, make sure that local government is transparent and accountable, see all the ways he can give back to his community, and have his town be as interesting and alive online as it is offline.

Tim is also a believer in American ingenuity and knows that products like Patch will help deliver a commercially viable way for communities to support the important work of local journalists, institutions, governments, and businesses.

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