FALSE

Hi there! I'd be happy to help you clear this up. It turns out that the claim that Hotmail sold for only $2 million is False. In reality, Microsoft purchased the email service for a much larger sum, widely reported to be approximately $400 million 91014. The acquisition was officially announced on December 31, 1997 34, after founders Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith had launched the service in 1996 2. Microsoft made this move to integrate free web-based email into its Microsoft Network (MSN) services 111. While there are some variations in reports—with one source even suggesting a figure as high as $500 million 13—the consensus among financial experts and historians is that the price tag was in the 400 million dollar range 1014, which is quite a bit more than $2 million!