Google is close to acquiring Meebo, according to a recent report by AllThingsD, citing two unnamed sources familiar with the matter. The acquisition price for the company would be roughly $100 million, said one of the sources.

Meebo CEO Seth Sternberg did not make any comment, and AllThingsD reportedly received the dismissive "We can't comment on rumor or speculation" response from a Google spokeswoman.

Meebo is based in Mountain View, California, and has been founded in 2005 by Sternberg, CTO Sandy Jen and now advisor Elaine Wherry, who met at Stanford. Over the past seven years, the company has committed to various social products and customers. Meebo started out as a Web-based instant messaging service, that is still available as Meebo Messenger. It provides similar services as Yahoo Instant Messenger, but without requiring users to download or install anything. The instant messaging service provides "rooms" designed help users share media and Web sites more easily, and developers can create apps and services to run on the architecture.

Then, the company launched the Meebo Bar, a JavaScript plug-in that sits at the bottom of Web pages, enabling publishers to add social interaction and sharing, as well as advertising overlay on their sites. Meebo also offers mobile versions for its products. Currently, the company's home page is pushing a tool designed to help users "create an interesting profile to get new and timely information about the things that matter to you."

Since it was founded in 2005, Meebo has raised more than $60 million in funding, including a $25 million Series D round led by Khosla Ventures back in 2010, as AllThingsD points out. Other Meebo backers include Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Sequoia Capital.

Why Google would want to acquire Meebo, or whether the acquisition is true or just a rumor, is not certain at this point. Google already has a social networking site - Google+, a chat service - Google Talk, and it has a toolbar as well, though it is not very popular. Consequently, why would Google want to invest about $100 million in a company like Meebo?

One reason could be that Google needs socially driven targeting to bolster its Google+ efforts. And considering Facebook's dominance in social networking, Meebo is likely not ready to achieve this by itself. Meebo's team of 173 people, many of them engineers, and/or with solid marketing and media backgrounds, does seem to make a better match with the Google brand, and such an acquisition would likely be mutually beneficial.

(reported by Alexandra Burlacu, edited by Dave Clark)