RedHerring reports about Murdoch's newest investment:

Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. paid VeriSign $188 million Tuesday to buy a 51 percent controlling interest in VeriSign's mobile phone entertainment subsidiary Jamba.

The companies said they would form a joint venture out of Jamba and News Corp.'s Fox Mobile Entertainment assets. They hope to reach up to 1 billion cell phone customers across 30 territories with the venture.

"We believe this sale is a savvy way for VeriSign to minimize volatility from Jamba's revenues, capture a new distribution channel with high-flyer MySpace.com, acquire additional content, get some cash, and return focus to its core business of providing intelligent network infrastructure software," wrote Raymond James & Associates analysts Mike Latimore and Shyam Patil in a research note.

Jamba has been part of the Verisign empire since 2004 as it came in for not so easy $273 million.

Well informed sources are full of stories of the culture clashes between Verisign's digital rights management philosophy and the marketing and sales ideas that drove and drive Jamba. While Jamba should have enabled to take Verisign infrastructure knowledge from the Internet to the wireless world bot sides clashed over how to proceed best.

Jamba showed a great performance in the US as it introduced Jamster in 2004/2005 and made around $500 million in revenues (global) in 2005. Jamba reportedly produced close $100 million in profits for Verisign in 2005. Now in 2006 the Jamba/Jamster staff departed more or less completely and the company lost revenue in most sectors (UK, USA are the hardest hit).

Working with Fox is a great deal for Verisign as it can go easier on putting the beast on a leach. Fox may have the right experience to make Jamba/ Jamster more successful plus Versign may have secured access to exclsuive content and free advertising in the Fox network. Getting free or discounted access to teh MySpace gang might prove superbly lucrative for Jamba (and maybe less annoying and looping Jamba ads on MTV!).

Financially a valuation of $360 million for Jamster may not seem like such a great deal (considering the $273 Verisign paid) but with the add. $100 in profits and pushes in market cap for Verisign itself it paid off rather handsomely. And maybe Murdoch shows what he is able to do here one more time in near future.