Google reduces public disclosure of acquisitions

Google is becoming more secretive about its acquisitions as the Internet company hunts for promising innovations and engineering talent to help shape the future of technology.

The subtle change surfaced in Google's 2013 annual report. Google didn't quantify the total number of deals that it closed in 2013 in the regulatory filing, marking the first time that the Mountain View company has withheld that detail since going public in 2004. Instead of specifying the total number of acquisitions during 2013, Google only said it spent a combined $489 million on all deals besides its purchase of online mapping service Waze.