Monster Buys HotJobs form Yahoo! for $225million

TechCrunch

Yahoo has been trying to unload HotJobs for a while, and it finally came to a deal with Monster, which will take the site off of Yahoo’s hands for $225 million in cash. As part of the deal, Monster will continue to power Yahoo’s job listings for three years.

Both Hotjobs and Monster have been lagging newer job search sites such as Indeed, which searches the entire Web for job listings. According to comScore, Indeed’s job search reached 8.4 million individuals in the U.S. in December, 2009, compared to only 5.4 million for HotJobs and 6.1 million for Monster. Maybe with the acquisition, Monster can take the top spot again, although there is a lot of overlap in those numbers.

For Yahoo, it gets rid of a declining property, boosts to its cash position, and can focus on growth areas. Yahoo has been selling off or shutting dow non-core assets, including recently selling Zimbra to VMWare for $350 million, shutting down its Shopping API, and of course the long-awaited deal with Microsoft to hand over its search to Bing.

Monster recently launched its 6Sense semantic search technology across different products including resume and candidate search. 6Sense is aimed at bringing up more relevant results even when there is no exact keyword match by using semantic analysis and understanding the different ays that the same job or job requirements can be described. Monster needs all the help it can get. Today it announced fourth quarter revenues of $213 million, down 27 percent, and a net loss of $2.1 million. For the year, revenues were down 32 percent to $905 million. Full year net income was $19 million, compared to $125 million in 2008.

The End is Here: Yahoo Closes Geocities

Julie McCormick / Search Engine Journal

This past summer I wrote about how Yahoo was going to finally shut down Geocities this fall. That day is finally here, and the internet will never be the same. Life will go on, of course, but early web adopters will no longer be able to amuse themselves by looking back at their earliest web creations.

After 15 years (it was launched in 1994), GeoCities had long been irrelevant and outdated.

Sure, there’s always archive.org, but due to the fact that few GeoCities sites ever received any notable traffic, the majority are not likely to be found there. And yea, GeoCities’ old rival Tripod still exists, but it’s not really quite the same, is it?

There’s not much more to say that I haven’t already said. You may have been old and feeble, GeoCities, but we’ll always look back fondly upon the good ol’ days.

RIP.

Yahoo To Discontinue Paid Inclusion Program

At the end of 2009 Yahoo will no longer be offering the paid inclusion advertising program. This unexpected move from Yahoo comes as a shock to most speculators.

From Yahoo

“We are committing our resources and efforts to our core areas of focus, including improving the search experience and relevancy of our ads to increase user engagement and ROI for advertisers, and as a result, have decided to exit Search Submit. We have stepped up innovation in Search Marketing, recently rolling out search retargeting, Rich Ads in Search and improved matching technology, and in Consumer Search, with enhancements like the new search results page. These enhancements deliver value, control, innovation and relevance to our advertisers, leading to increased ROI.

Yahoo! will exit Search Submit at the end of 2009. Yahoo! is providing those advertisers affected by the decision a sufficient lead time to assist in the transition. In addition, Yahoo! has recently announced a series of important enhancements to its Search advertising business and will work closely with many Search Submit advertisers to provide them with search solutions that will benefit their businesses.”

Adobe Buys Omniture for $1.8 Billion

The Associated Press

Adobe Systems Inc. said Tuesday it will buy the Web analytic software company Omniture for about $1.8 billion, giving the maker of content-creation software a way to let marketers monitor the effectiveness of such content.

San Jose, Calif.-based Adobe Systems Inc. said it will buy Omniture Inc. for $21.50 per share in cash, a premium of 24 percent over Omniture’s closing stock price Tuesday.

The announcement came as Adobe said it earned $136 million, or 26 cents per share, in the fiscal third quarter that ended in August, down 29 percent from the same time a year earlier.

Excluding one-time items, Adobe earned a profit of 35 cents per share, a penny above what analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting. The maker of Photoshop, Flash and Acrobat software says its revenue fell 21 percent to $697.5 million.

Yahoo sells $150 mln shares of China's Alibaba.com

Mon Sep 14, 2009 5:30pm EDT
By Alison Liu and Alexei Oreskovic

HONG KONG/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc is selling its 1.14 percent stake in Chinese Internet marketplace Alibaba.com for about $150 million, nearly two years after the company went public.

Yahoo still holds a 40 percent stake in the unlisted parent company, Alibaba Group, and reiterated in a statement on Monday that it believes the investment is an important, long-term way to participate in the China market.

Speculation about whether Yahoo planned to unwind its ties with Alibaba arose after Jerry Yang stepped down as chief executive of the U.S. Internet company.

Yahoo paid more than $1 billion in 2005 as part of its investment in Alibaba Group, which was co-founded by Chinese entrepreneur and former English teacher Jack Ma. Yang, a native Taiwanese, was a strong supporter of the deal and used to travel frequently to China and appear with Ma.

"Yahoo regularly evaluates its financial investments and the value of its 1 percent direct IPO investment in Alibaba.com has increased substantially. This increase is why Yahoo sold this financial position," Yahoo said, noting that it would result in pretax proceeds of about $150 million.

Yahoo is selling 57.48 million shares of Alibaba.com at HK$19.80-20.30 each, according to a term sheet obtained by Reuters on Monday. The price range represents a 4 percent to 6.4 percent discount to the stock's closing price of HK$21.15 on Monday.

After dropping steadily in 2008, Alibaba shares have come charging back this year, nearly quadrupling since January.

Analysts said Yahoo's move would put pressure on Alibaba.com's stock, amid signs that its valuation has stretched well beyond its peers.

"I think it is negative for the share price not just because this is a profit-taking activity, but it reflects some heightened risks (they may have) about the fundamentals of the business," said Steven Liu analyst with DBS Vickers.

Despite Yahoo's move, analysts did not think the company was changing its strategy in China, the world's largest Internet market by users.

Carol Bartz, who succeeded Yang as CEO, has been clear that "the way she wants to play China is through Alibaba," said Sanford Bernstein analyst Jeff Lindsay.

Bartz doesn't want to get into operating a business in China itself, Lindsay added. "It's too expensive, too much of a drain on capital."

Under the 2005 deal, Yahoo handed over exclusive rights to the "Yahoo China" brand to Alibaba Group. While the Yahoo China site has struggled to gain share against Baidu.com, Alibaba Group owns other attractive units including the fast-growing Chinese online auction site Taobao.

Alibaba Group is one of the dominant players in China and is still showing strong growth, so Yahoo wants to be careful about selling too early, said Kaufman Brothers analyst Aaron Kessler.

With more than $3 billion of cash and short-term securities, Yahoo doesn't need the cash, Kessler said.....

Yahoo Chief: ‘We Have Never Been a Search Company’
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/07/yahoo-ceo-we-have-never-been-a-search-company/?ref=technology

By Ashlee Vance

The dust has settled – for the moment - on the Microsoft and Yahoo search and advertising deal. So, perhaps there’s room for a bit of reflection.

Last week, Brad Stone and I interviewed Carol Bartz, Yahoo’s chief executive, and she -– along with an animated security guard -– provided some insights into the company’s culture that have been arguably under-reported by the press.

For one, Yahoo views search in a different manner than Google and Microsoft. The Bing and Google boys want to have standalone search franchises that function as helpers for our brains. If you’re out hunting for something specific, you hit Google or Bing in the hopes of finding an answer.

Ms. Bartz places Yahoo’s position in a rather different light. “We have never been a search company,” she said. “It is, ‘I am on Yahoo. I am going to do a search.’”

It’s a subtle verbal difference but perhaps an obvious practical one to Internet users. Yahoo, according to Ms. Bartz, simply feeds search results for people who have grown curious while reading one of its news stories or watching a video. It doesn’t generally pop into peoples’ minds as the first place to go look for answers during the course of their day-to-day activities.

As such, Ms. Bartz said she could continue to live with the 20 percent or so share of the search market Yahoo has today. “I am a very viable number,” she said. “It is very profitable, and we would be happy all day long.”

The biggest thing for Yahoo is increasing the number of pages people consume and slapping as many display ads as possible across those pages. “My fortunes are tied to my pages,” Ms. Bartz said.

When it comes to those pages, Yahoo seems to be in a state of confusion. Its Sports section, for example, has reporters producing top-notch original material ranging from scoopy news items and blogs to long-form analysis pieces. The other parts of Yahoo tend to rely far more heavily on stories and other content from outside organizations.

According to Ms. Bartz, the majority of Yahoo’s sites will go the way of Sports. In particular, Yahoo will throw investments behind its entertainment, finance and news operations. Ms. Bartz noted that there are plenty of unemployed journalists out there to pick up.

This is, of course, a delicate dance for Yahoo. The company’s strength has been in collecting information, not producing it. As Yahoo competes more and more with its partners, they may turn their back on Yahoo’s immense page views.

In addition, Ms. Bartz will remember that Terry Semel, a longtime Warner Bros. executive, was brought in before to turn Yahoo into more of a media company. Mr. Semel’s tenure was perhaps characterized more for losing to Google than anything else.

Ms. Bartz has decided to correct past mistakes by getting all of the employees on the same page and presenting a more consistent look across Yahoo’s sites. In addition, she’s trying to boost morale and get the energy of the company up again –- a task hurt by the hit Yahoo’s shares took after the Microsoft deal was announced.

“I felt bad for the employees because they think it’s a report card,” Ms. Bartz said.

That said, Ms. Bartz seems to have made quite the impression on at least one of her employees.

The security guard at Yahoo’s Sunnyvale, Calif., headquarters comes to work with purple fingernails, purple lipstick, purple eyeliner and purple tints to her hair –- championing Yahoo’s corporate color. She’s very thorough when checking in guests, and chock full of enthusiasm.

The guard, um, encouraged Brad Stone and me to treat Ms. Bartz with respect. “She’s my girl.”

Yahoo-MSFT Deal: Details From SEC Filing
http://paidcontent.org/article/419-yahoo-msft-deal-details-from-sec-filing/

Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) just filed with SEC with some more details of its search deal with Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT). Some standouts:

—The deal details have to be hashed out by by October 27, 2009
—The deal can be terminated if not implemented by July 29, 2010
—Microsoft will hire at least 400 Yahoo employees
—No termination fee, apparently
—Microsoft will pay Yahoo $50 million annually during the first three years, and Yahoo “may use these payments to partially cover transition and implementation costs not otherwise covered under the Search Agreement,” the filing says. So costs associated with transition.
—After five years, Microsoft can choose to take over search advertising sales for premium advertisers. If it does so, Yahoo’s share of revenue will go up to 93 percent. However, if Yahoo chooses to continue selling search ads to premium advertisers over Microsoft’s objection, its share of revenue will fall to 83 percent.
—If Microsoft does not exercise its option to take over premium search advertising sales, Yahoo’s share of search revenue will increase to 90 percent, after five years.
—Yahoo has the option to use Microsoft’s mapping and mobile search services (It has already said it will use Bing’s mobile search)

—Very interesting: There are deal termination provisions which are calibrated against Google (NSDQ: GOOG). Yahoo can terminate if the trailing 12-month average of the RPS (revenue per search query) in the U.S. of Yahoo and Microsoft’s combined queries falls below a specified percentage of Google’s estimated RPS measured on a comparable basis, or if the combined Yahoo and Microsoft query market share in the United States falls below a specified percentage (Ed: would love to know that figure); also on the fifth anniversary of the search agreement, and any time thereafter, Yahoo has the right to terminate the agreement if the trailing 12-month average of Yahoo’s U.S. RPS is less than a specified percentage of Google’s estimated RPS

—Other termination provisions, though seem unlikely to happen: either party may terminate upon “repeated material breaches of material provisions of the Search Agreement such that it is unlikely that the breaching party is willing or able to continue to perform its obligations under the Search Agreement without continuing to materially breach it; or Yahoo may terminate if Microsoft attempts to exit the business of algorithmic search or search monetization, either by ceasing to offer the services or by selling or attempting to sell all or substantially all of either its algorithmic search services business or paid search services business to an unaffiliated third party.”
—If a termination event occurs in the United States, the entire agreement may be terminated. If a termination event does not occur in the United States a party’s termination right is limited to the specific country or countries in which the event occurs.
—If Microsoft proposes or attempts to sell all or substantially all of either its algorithmic search services business or paid search services business to an unaffiliated third party, Yahoo will have a right of first refusal and right of last offer to purchase such businesses.
—Microsoft’s search API will be made available to Yahoo “at full parity” to what Microsoft’s teams can access.
—Yahoo will have “full visibility into Microsoft product roadmap and parity with Microsoft’s internal teams in the product update prioritization process.”
—Microsoft cannot treat Yahoo and its syndication partners less favorably than Microsoft’s own partners.
—Microsoft will provide Yahoo with all the data it collects as part of the relationship. Microsoft cannot use the data to enhance Microsoft products and services other than those covered by the agreement (ie search).
—Yahoo will grant Microsoft an exclusive license to “specified Yahoo algorithmic and paid search technology.” Once the agreement ends, the license will remain in effect but it will no longer be exclusive.
—Microsoft also has an option for a non-exclusive license to Yahoo’s search technology which it could use to “provide online services” on Microsoft owned and operated websites and also third parties. But Microsoft has to pay for that license.
—And Yahoo can choose to have Microsoft offer search services through a “white label solution,” instead of the Microsoft API, in certain countries. From the filing: “Yahoo! may substitute Yahoo! applications or services for Microsoft applications or services within the White Label Solution.”

Yahoo profit drops but not as far as feared
July 23, 2008 By Associated Press
Yahoo Inc.’s profit slipped again in the second quarter, a recurring theme that has frustrated shareholders and raised doubts about the Internet company’s future.
While the results released Tuesday missed analyst expectations, the performance wasn’t as bad as many investors feared after Internet search and advertising leader Google Inc. disappointed Wall Street with its second-quarter earnings last week.
What’s more, Yahoo management maintained its revenue outlook for the remainder of 2008. The confident stance eased concerns about Yahoo’s financial erosion worsening amid the dreary economy in the United States and parts of Europe.
“They did better than the worst expectations,” said Canaccord Adams analyst Colin Gillis. “It was a ‘rice-cracker’ quarter. It didn’t taste great, but it wasn’t totally horrible either.”
Yahoo earned $131 million, or nine cents per share, from April through June. That was down 18% from $161 million, or 11 cents per share, at the same time last year.
Analysts had projected earnings of 11 cents per share in the most recent quarter, according to Thomson Financial.
A big chunk of the earnings shortfall stemmed from $22 million in bills that piled up as Yahoo dealt with an unsolicited takeover bid from Microsoft Corp. and a now-resolved battle for control of its board with activist investor Carl Icahn. Yahoo has now spent $36 million on its wrestling match with Microsoft and Icahn.
Revenue for the quarter totalled $1.8 billion, a 6% improvement from $1.7 billion at the same time last year.
After subtracting commissions paid to Yahoo’s advertising partners, revenue stood at $1.35 billion—about $20 million below the average analyst estimate.
Yahoo’s latest lacklustre performance of the past 2 1/2 years is likely to intensify the already tremendous pressure on management to lift the company’s long-slumping stock price after rebuffing Microsoft’s $47.5 billion takeover offer.
With that bid off the table, Yahoo’s market value is about $18 billion below Microsoft’s last offer. Dismayed shareholders will get their chance to vent at Yahoo’s annual meeting Aug. 1.

YAHOO! TO STRENGTHEN COMPETITIVE POSITION IN ONLINE ADVERTISING THROUGH NON-EXCLUSIVE AGREEMENT WITH GOOGLE
Sunnyvale, CA, June 12, 2008

Yahoo! Inc., a leading global Internet company, announced today that it has reached an agreement with Google Inc. that will enhance its ability to compete in the converging search and display marketplace, advancing the company’s open strategy. The agreement enables Yahoo! to run ads supplied by Google alongside Yahoo!’s search results and on some of its web properties in the United States and Canada. The agreement is non-exclusive, giving Yahoo! the ability to display paid search results from Google, other third parties, and Yahoo!’s own Panama marketplace.

Under the terms of the agreement, Yahoo! will select the search term queries for which – and the pages on which – Yahoo! may offer Google paid search results. Yahoo! will define its users’ experience and will determine the number and placement of the results provided by Google and the mix of paid results provided by Panama, Google or other providers. The agreement applies to paid search and content match and does not apply to algorithmic search. The agreement also applies to current partners in Yahoo’s publisher network.

Yahoo! CEO and co-founder Jerry Yang said, “We believe that the convergence of search and display is the next major development in the evolution of the rapidly changing online advertising industry. Our strategies are specifically designed to capitalize on this convergence -- and this agreement helps us move them forward in a significant way. It also represents an important next step in our open strategy, building on the progress we have already made in advancing a more open marketplace.”

“This agreement provides a source of funds to both deliver financial value to stockholders from search monetization and to invest in our broader strategy to transform display advertising and advance our starting point objectives with users,” said Yahoo! President Sue Decker. “It enhances competition by promoting our ability to compete in the marketplace where we are especially well positioned: in the convergence of search and display.”

New documents shed light on Yahoo saga
June 04, 2008 By Associated Press

Yahoo Inc. chief executive Jerry Yang pushed for an employee severance program that made it more expensive for Microsoft Corp. to engineer a takeover, according to previously sealed documents in a shareholder lawsuit against Yahoo.
The details about the severance program and other information about Yahoo’s efforts to thwart Microsoft’s takeover bid became available Monday after a Delaware judge released redacted portions of a shareholder complaint filed last month after Microsoft withdrew an oral offer to buy Yahoo for US$47.5 billion, or $33 per share.
The severance plan would have increased Microsoft’s costs by $462 million to $2.1 billion, based on the software maker’s initial Jan. 31 offer of $44.6 billion, or $31 per share, according to Yahoo estimates released Monday.
The severance program, adopted Feb. 12, guaranteed a mix of cash and stock payments to all 13,800 Yahoo employees if they were either fired or quit after being reassigned to a new job within two years after a Microsoft takeover.
The program’s costs—and how they might have discouraged Microsoft from raising its bid above $47.5 billion—could become fodder in a shareholder mutiny that activist investor Carl Icahn is leading against Yahoo’s board.
Spurred by shareholders upset at Yahoo’s board’s handling of the bid, Icahn has filed a plan to replace the remaining nine directors unless the takeover talks are revived before Yahoo’s annual meeting in late July.
Microsoft hasn’t ruled out making another takeover attempt, although its recent talks with Yahoo have been limited to a business deal involving Yahoo’s online search operations.
Besides delving into the costs of Yahoo’s employee severance program, the newly released documents include a reference to Yahoo records indicating Microsoft had offered to buy the Internet pioneer for about $40 per share in January 2007, only to be rebuffed.
Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer was still willing to negotiate privately when he phoned Yang on Jan. 31 this year to let him know the software maker was prepared to make another buyout offer, according to notes of the conversation included in the documents released Monday.
Ballmer said he would listen to a counterproposal and keep the negotiations private if Yang indicated Yahoo was receptive to a sale.
Ballmer also told Yang that Microsoft intended to offer $1.5 billion in incentives to retain Yahoo employees after a takeover, the documents said.
After Yang indicated Yahoo would take more than two days to respond to Microsoft’s Jan. 31 offer, Ballmer revealed the takeover attempt in a Feb. 1 press release.
As part of the effort to fend off Microsoft, Yang quickly began working on the employee severance plan to protect workers if Microsoft wound up owning Yahoo.
After some internal discussion to limit the most generous benefits to about 700 Yahoo executives, Yang decided the packages should provide accelerated stock vesting for all workers.

Yahoo, WPP form multiyear ad-trading partnership
Fri May 16, 2008 6:59am EDT (Reporting by Eric Auchard, editing by Will Waterman)

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Embattled Yahoo Inc has struck an advertising partnership deal with WPP Group that will let WPP buy ads on Yahoo's online ad exchange, the companies said late on Thursday.
Yahoo, which recently spurned a $47.5 billion unsolicited takeover bid from Microsoft Corp only to face a proxy battle led by activist investor Carl Icahn this week, said the deal would first involve WPP units GroupM and 24/7 Real Media.
In a statement, the companies said that as part of the deal, WPP advertising agencies would, through its 24/7 Real Media arm, develop a proprietary advertising media trading platform that takes advantage of Yahoo's Right Media exchange.
Yahoo acquired Right Media last year in a bid to expand sales of the online display advertisements preferred by corporate brand marketers beyond its existing base of blue-chip clients to social network sites and other sites off Yahoo.
"More and more, we see the need for agencies and media and technology companies to work together to create a new level of value," said Mark Read, director of strategy and chief executive of the London ad conglomerate's WPP Digital unit.
WPP will also work with Yahoo to develop a WPP marketplace, giving WPP's ad agencies wider access to potential advertising inventory, or places to advertise, across the Internet, as well as insight into how to buy ads cost-effectively for clients.
The WPP-Yahoo marketplace will also be open to outside publishers, helping to increase the overall volume, while cutting the costs, of the WPP ad-trading marketplace.

Yahoo stock plunges?
posted May 05, 2008 From kottke.org

The big tech/business news of the day is Yahoo's stock "plunge" following the withdrawl of Microsoft's takeover offer. I'm sure plunge headlines sell newspapers and all, but the more long-term story is more interesting.
On Jan 31, the day before Microsoft offered $31/share for Yahoo, YHOO was at $19.18/share (market cap: $26.4 billion) and MSFT was at $32.60/share (market cap: $303.6 billion). At the close of trading today, YHOO closed at $24.37/share (market cap: $33.5 billion) and MSFT was at $29.08/share (market cap: $270.8 billion). In other words, the Microsoft offer increased the value of Yahoo! Inc. by more than $7 billion and decreased the value of Microsoft Corporation by almost $33 billion. In still other words, in attempting to take Yahoo by force, they let an amount equal to Yahoo slip through their fingers. Why isn't anyone writing about Yahoo's amazing stock gains and Microsoft's plunge?

Yahoo! Announces Agreement to Acquire IndexTools’ Analytics Business
Acquisition intended to enhance platform for comprehensive Web analytics and extend offerings for on-line marketers

SUNNYVALE, Calif. April 9, 2008 – Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO), a leading global Internet company, today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire substantially all of the assets of Tensa Kft., more commonly known as IndexTools, a leading provider of Web analytics software for online marketing. The acquisition includes IndexTools’ Web analytics business and technology as well as its Tensa R&D Kft. subsidiary. Upon completion of the acquisition, the addition of the IndexTools’ assets is intended to expand Yahoo!’s powerful set of services designed to maximize its clients’ online marketing efforts.
“Yahoo! believes that the ability to generate the most valuable and relevant insights is essential to seizing market opportunities and creating successful campaigns,“ said Bassel Ojjeh, senior vice president and head of Yahoo!’s Strategic Data Solutions group. “We expect that the IndexTools’ technology platform will provide our customers the opportunity to more quickly uncover and act on these insights, enhancing Yahoo!’s status as a partner of choice in online marketing and the must buy for the world’s advertisers.”
The acquired technology is expected to extend Yahoo!’s current analytics offerings by adding capabilities to deliver relevant insights and metrics for online campaigns that run across the entire Yahoo! network. Following the acquisition, the first group of customers to benefit from these enhanced tools will be more than 150,000 small-to-medium businesses marketing on the Web with Yahoo!. Additional capabilities enabling third-party developers to monitor and optimize the traffic performance of their applications are expected to follow throughout the year following the acquisition.
“At the IndexTools group, we have developed a large base of global customers by delivering a reliable, scalable and comprehensive platform for monitoring and analyzing sophisticated marketing campaigns,” said Márton Szőke, Managing Director of Tensa. “Our commitment to generating the most important insights, and placing them at our customers’ fingertips, makes the IndexTools platform a wonderful match with Yahoo! and we are thrilled to have this opportunity to help advance online advertising as part of one of the world’s leading brands.”
“The passionate and talented engineers at IndexTools have built a powerful analytics solution and just as importantly, their focus on delighting customers with the features and tools they truly need to excel is an excellent fit with Yahoo!,“ said Ojjeh. “We’re excited and looking forward to welcoming these engineers to Yahoo!’s own deep engineering team.”
IndexTools offers a scalable analytics platform for companies' online marketing activity in each phase of the customer lifecycle. With IndexTools Web Analytics and Bid Management, businesses gain accurate, insightful and timely intelligence about the effectiveness of their online marketing.
The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to be completed in the first half of 2008.

YAHOO!’S BOARD OF DIRECTORS RESPONDS TO LATEST MICROSOFT LETTER
Sunnyvale, Calif., April 7, 2008 – The Board of Directors of Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO), a leading global Internet company, today sent the following letter to Steve Ballmer, Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft Corporation.

Dear Steve:

Our Board has reviewed your most recent letter with regard to the unsolicited proposal you made to acquire Yahoo! on January 31, 2008.
Our Board carefully considered your unsolicited proposal, unanimously concluded that it was not in the best interests of Yahoo! and our stockholders, and rejected it publicly on February 11, 2008. Our Board cited Yahoo!’s global brand, large worldwide audience, significant recent investments in advertising platforms and future growth prospects, free cash flow and earnings potential, as well as its substantial unconsolidated investments, as factors in its decision.

At the same time, we have continued to make clear that we are not opposed to a transaction with Microsoft if it is in the best interests of our stockholders. Our position is simply that any transaction must be at a value that fully reflects the value of Yahoo!, including any strategic benefits to Microsoft, and on terms that provide certainty to our stockholders.

Since disclosing our Board's position with respect to your proposal, we have presented our three-year financial and strategic plan to our stockholders, which supports our Board’s determination that your unsolicited proposal substantially undervalues Yahoo! Those meetings with our stockholders have also provided us an opportunity to hear their views.

We have continued to launch new products and to take actions which leverage our scale, technology, people and platforms as we execute on the strategy we publicly articulated.

Today, in fact, we are announcing AMP! from Yahoo!, a new advertising management platform designed to dramatically simplify the process of buying and selling ads online.

Finally, our Board has been actively and expeditiously exploring our strategic alternatives to maximize stockholder value, a process which is ongoing. All of these actions have been driven by our overarching commitment to maximize stockholder value.

Our Board's view of your proposal has not changed. We continue to believe that your proposal is not in the best interests of Yahoo! and our stockholders. Contrary to statements in your letter, stockholders representing a significant portion of our outstanding shares have indicated to us that your proposal substantially undervalues Yahoo!. Furthermore, as a result of the decrease in your own stock price, the value of your proposal today is significantly lower than it was when you made your initial proposal.

In contrast to your assertions about the effect of general economic conditions on our business, Yahoo!'s business forecasts are consistent with what we outlined in our last earnings call. As you know, we recently reaffirmed our Q1 and full year guidance, which is a testament to our ability to perform in line with our expectations despite the current economic environment. In addition, our three-year financial and strategic plan which we have made public demonstrates significant potential upside not previously communicated to the financial markets. This plan has received positive feedback from our stockholders, further strengthening the view that Yahoo! is worth well more as a standalone company than the value offered in your proposal, and would be even more valuable to Microsoft. Your own statements have made clear the strategic importance of Yahoo!'s substantial assets and capabilities to Microsoft.

We regret to say that your letter mischaracterizes the nature of our discussions with you. We have had constructive conversations together regarding a variety of topics, including integration and regulatory issues. Your comment that we have refused to enter into negotiations to conclude an agreement are particularly curious given we have already rejected your initial proposal, nominally $31 per share at the time, for substantially undervaluing Yahoo! and your suggestions in your letter and the media that you are considering lowering the value of your proposal. Moreover, Steve, you personally attended two of these meetings and could have advanced discussions in any way you saw fit.

As to antitrust, we have discussed with you our concerns. Any transaction between us would result in a thorough regulatory review in multiple jurisdictions. As a follow up to a recent meeting among our respective legal advisors we had on this topic, and at your request, we provided to you on March 28 a list of additional information we would need to further our understanding of the regulatory issues associated with any transaction. To date, you have still not provided any of the requested information.

We consider your threat to commence an unsolicited offer and proxy contest to displace our independent Board members to be counterproductive and inconsistent with your stated objective of a friendly transaction. We are confident that our stockholders understand that our independent Board is best positioned to objectively and knowledgably evaluate our Company's alternatives and to maximize value.

In conclusion, please allow us to restate our position, so there can be no confusion. We are open to all alternatives that maximize stockholder value. To be clear, this includes a transaction with Microsoft if it represents a price that fully recognizes the value of Yahoo! on a standalone basis and to Microsoft, is superior to our other alternatives, and provides certainty of value and certainty of closing. Lastly, we are steadfast in our commitment to choosing a path that maximizes stockholder value and we will not allow you or anyone else to acquire the company for anything less than its full value.

Very truly yours,

Jerry Yang
Chief Executive Officer

Roy Bostock
Chairman of the Board

TVO Goes Online with YAHOO! Canada
To Deliver Unique Educational Content to Parents

TORONTO, Ontario, March 25, 2008 -- Yahoo! Canada, a leading Canadian online destination, and TVO, a trusted provider of public educational media in Ontario for over 35 years, have today announced a deal to offer original, TVO-produced educational content coming soon to millions of parents via www.yahoo.ca . This marks TVO’s first deal with an online provider to extend its reach and deliver educational content in both text and video formats via the web.

According to Comscore’s Top Canadian Web Rankings for January 2008, Yahoo! Canada reaches 16.5 million Canadians online monthly – a significant, untapped audience for TVO. Additionally, the same report discovered that among Canadians with Internet access, almost 40 percent use the web for educational purposes.

“The dramatic increase in demand for online content creates exciting opportunities for partnering with content providers like TVO,” said Iain Wilson, Director Business Development, Yahoo! Canada. "Tapping into the web through Yahoo! Canada gives TVO the ability to greatly expand its reach and wow new audiences with fresh, innovative educational content whenever they go online.”

TVO is currently implementing a “going digital” strategy with the goal of reaching new audiences using a multi-platform content distribution approach. To meet the growing needs of viewers who prefer to access their favourite programs based on their own unique daily schedules, partnering with a trusted online content provider like Yahoo! Canada made perfect sense.

“TVO is focused on increasing our impact in the digital space with our unique, educational media resources,” says Lisa de Wilde, TVO’s Chief Executive Officer. “Working with Yahoo! Canada aligns with TVO’s digital strategy to make our content accessible to new audiences through alternative distribution channels, while exploring new revenue streams and business models.”

Although TVO creates a wide range of educational resources for people of all ages, its initial efforts with Yahoo! Canada will be aimed at engaging web-savvy parents who look online for resources related to their children’s learning and success in school. TVO will deliver content on subjects ranging from managing homework time to dealing with bullying, including a compilation of resources for parents of children with autism and a complete inventory of TVO’s Your Voice, the first and only online interactive program for parents built on education issues .

“At TVO, we’re committed to empowering people through knowledge, and that includes partnering with parents in their children’s education,” says de Wilde. “By integrating our parent-focused educational content with a major online content provider like Yahoo! Canada, we can reach more people, while showcasing the relevance of our trusted brand.”

Yahoo Opens Yahoo! Research Israel Lab
March 11th, 2008 by Loren Baker, editor - Search Engine Journal
Yahoo has opened a new research lab in Haifa; the Yahoo! Research Israel Lab, which will be led by Dr. Ronny Lempel. Lempel is a renowned information organization and retrieval expert who will report directly to Dr. Ricardo Baeza-Yates, vice president of Yahoo! Research according to Yahoo.
The Yahoo! Research Israel Lab will focus on boiling down complex technology problems into simple solutions to change the game in Web search, which Yahoo says will strengthen its global strategy to establish Yahoo! Search as an indispensable starting point for users on the Web
“Israel is fertile ground for incredibly talented technologists, researchers and engineers, and the Yahoo! Research Israel Lab provides the best opportunity to create the technologies that will underpin the next generation of search on the Internet,” Lempel said. “I look forward to building the Haifa team with the best talent this region has to offer.”

AOL to Acquire Global Social Media Network Bebo
(businesswire.com)--AOL announced today that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Bebo (bebo.com), a leading global social media network. Together with its AIM and ICQ personal communications network, the acquisition will give AOL a premier position in the fast growing world of social media with a network of approximately 80 million unique users.
With a total membership of more than 40 million worldwide, Bebo is a global social media network which combines community, self-expression and entertainment to enable its users to consume, create, discover and share content. Bebo is one of the leading social networks in the UK, and is ranked number one in Ireland and New Zealand, and number three in the U.S. Its users are heavily engaged and view an average of 78 pages per usage day. Bebo has approximately 100 employees operating in offices in the UK, San Francisco and Austin, TX.
The deal comes just one week after AOL’s launch of Open AIM 2.0, an initiative that allows the developer community greater freedom to access the AIM network and integrate AIM into its sites and applications, and the announcement by Apple of a downloadable AIM application for the iPhone.
Under the terms of the agreement, AOL will acquire Bebo for $850 million in cash.
“Bebo is the perfect complement to AOL’s personal communications network and puts us in a leading position in social media,” said Randy Falco, Chairman and CEO, AOL. “What drew us to Bebo was its substantial and fast-growing worldwide user-base, its vision of a truly social web, and the monetization opportunities that leverage Platform-A across our combined global audience. This positions us to offer advertisers even greater reach and marketers significant insights into the desires and needs of consumers.”
“AOL understands the shifting dynamics of the Web and has clearly demonstrated its commitment to leveraging the ever-increasing power of social networks,” said Bebo President, Joanna Shields. “With one and the same vision in this area, it was a natural progression for Bebo to join AOL, and we look forward to working together to continue to expand the online social experience globally.”
“Bebo’s dynamic management team recognizes that the Internet is less about destination and more about connecting people, culture and lifestyles,” said Ron Grant, President and COO, AOL. “This acquisition supports our key objectives – accelerating the growth, engagement and monetization of one of the world’s most engaged online communities.”
Upon closing the transaction, current President Joanna Shields will continue to run Bebo and will report to Ron Grant.
Analyst eMarketer predicts that by 2011, $4.1 billion will be spent worldwide for social network advertising – a dramatic increase from the $480 million spent in 2006. In 2008 alone, global ad spend in the social networking arena is expected to increase 75% year over year, amounting to $2.1 billion (eMarketer, Social Network Marketing: Ad Spending and Usage, December 2007).

Today in history:

Yahoo! Is Incorporated
In 1994, two Stanford PhD candidates began indexing interesting websites as a hobby. “Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web” launched as Yahoo! in 1995, and it has since grown to become the largest information portal on the Web. Initially, Yahoo! distinguished itself as a “directory” by employing indexing specialists to categorize websites, but the Web has since grown so large that the use of automated spiders has become something of a necessity.

Early history (1994-1996)
In January 1994, Stanford graduate students Jerry Yang and David Filo created a website named "Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web." Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web was a directory of other websites, organized in a hierarchy, as opposed to a searchable index of pages. In April 1994, "Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web" was renamed "Yahoo!". Filo and Yang said they selected the name because they liked the word's general definition, as in Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift: "rude, unsophisticated, uncouth." The name can also be a backronym for "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle". Its URL was akebono.stanford.edu/yahoo. By the end of 1994, Yahoo had already received one million hits. Yang and Filo realized their website had massive business potential, and on 1 March 1995, Yahoo was incorporated. On 12 April 1996, Yahoo had its initial public offering, raising $33.8 million dollars, by selling 2.6 million shares at $13 each. "Yahoo" had already been trademarked for barbecue sauce, knives (by EBSCO Industries) and human propelled watercraft (by Old Town Canoe Co.). Therefore, in order to get the trademark, Yang and Filo added the exclamation mark to the name.

Yahoo board formally rebuffs Microsoft's US$44.6 billion takeover bid
The Associated Press
Yahoo Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) spurned Microsoft Corp.'s (NASDAQ:MSFT) US$44.6 billion takeover bid as inadequate Monday, betting that it can elicit a higher offer from the world's largest software maker or find another way to deliver a comparable payoff to its shareholders.
The rebuff by the slumping Internet pioneer had been widely anticipated after word of Yahoo's intention was leaked during the weekend.
In its formal response, Yahoo said its board had concluded Microsoft's unsolicited offer "substantially undervalues" the Sunnyvale-based company.
Yahoo indicated it could be lured to the negotiating table if Microsoft ups the ante, without mentioning the price it has in mind.
"The board of directors is continually evaluating all of its strategic options in the context of the rapidly evolving industry environment and we remain committed to pursuing initiatives that maximize value for all stockholders," Yahoo said in a statement.
Investors appeared confident that Microsoft wants Yahoo badly enough to raise the stakes. Yahoo shares rose 34 cents to $29.54 in Monday's morning trading while Microsoft shares fell 46 cents to $28.10.
If Microsoft doesn't raise its offer, Yahoo chief executive Jerry Yang assured employees in a Monday e-mail that the company is poised to rebound on its own and become a "must buy" in the $45 billion online advertising market.
"We have accomplished a great deal in a very short time," wrote Yang, a company co-founder who promised things would get better after he became CEO eight months ago. "Yahoo is a faster-moving, better organized, more nimble company well on its way to transforming the experiences of its users, advertisers, publishers and developers."
Just two days before Microsoft made its bid, Yang had warned Yahoo faced "headwinds" that made it unlikely the company's performance would improve significantly until 2009.
Yahoo's stock price had dropped by more than 40 per cent in the three months leading to Microsoft's bid, valued at $31 per share when it was announced Feb. 1. The offer was 62 per cent above Yahoo's market value at the time.
Many analysts believe Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft will eventually raise its bid to $35 to $40 per share, sweetening the pot by $5 billion to $12 billion in an effort to negotiate an amicable sale.
Microsoft was prepared to pay at least $40 per share for Yahoo a year ago, according to a person familiar with the talks between the two companies a year ago. Yahoo wasn't interested then because it was confident in its own strategy, said the person, who didn't want to be identified because Microsoft's 2007 offer was never publicly disclosed.
But a higher bid now could hurt Microsoft's own stock price, which has been slipping amid concerns that a Yahoo takeover could be more trouble than its worth. Microsoft's market value has plunged by more than $40 billion, or 14 per cent, since the bid was made public.
Microsoft representatives didn't immediately respond to requests for comment Monday morning.
RBC Capital Markets analyst Jordan Rohan predicted Yahoo's board will have little choice but to sell the company if Microsoft raises its bid to $35 or $36 per share. "Yahoo management has already exhausted the patience of its largest, longest-suffering shareholders," Rohan wrote in a Monday note.
If it doesn't want to pay more money, Microsoft could take its original bid directly to Yahoo's shareholders. Microsoft's management began preparing for that possibility last week by meeting with some of Yahoo's major shareholders to rally support for its offer.
In a more extreme tactic, Microsoft could try to override Yahoo's board by trying to oust the current directors later this year - a risky manoeuvre that would likely create hard feelings that would make it more difficult to cobble the two businesses together if a deal were consummated.
Yahoo also could fend off Microsoft by exercising an anti-takeover device, known as a "poison pill," that would issue more company shares to make a buyout too expensive to pull off.
Although its profits have been dwindling during the past two years, Yahoo still possesses one of the Internet's biggest audiences and most valuable franchises. Microsoft believes it can build on those assets to become a more formidable competitor to Google Inc., which now holds a commanding lead in the lucrative online search and advertising markets.
Yahoo has reportedly been exploring an advertising partnership with Google as one way to boost its profits and remain independent. The company also has been looking for other suitors that might be interested in countering Microsoft's bid, but so far no one has stepped forward.
By rejecting Microsoft's initial offer, Yahoo's board is running the risk that the company's stock will plunge below $20 per share again if its suitor decides to walk away.
That scenario would probably unleash a flood of shareholder lawsuits, intensifying the pressure on Yahoo's management team to deliver on a long-awaited turnaround that has been in the works for the past 18 months.

Microsoft says expects Yahoo to accept bid quickly
Reuters - Mon, Feb 04, 2008
Microsoft Corp said on Monday that its $44.6 billion unsolicited offer for Yahoo Inc was generous and it expects Yahoo's board and shareholders to agree to the buyout quickly.
"We trust the Yahoo board and the Yahoo shareholders will join with us quickly in deciding to move down an integrated path," Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said in an annual strategy meeting with analysts.
Microsoft's comments follow a weekend of maneuvering by Yahoo, which, according to sources familiar with Yahoo's strategy, is considering a business alliance with Google Inc to rebuff Microsoft's proposal. It has also received preliminary contacts from media, technology, telecommunications and financial companies, another source close to Yahoo said.
At the same meeting, Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell also said the company may borrow money for the first time in its history to fund a portion of the 50-50 cash and stock offer for Yahoo.
"If you look at the cash component ... we could fund most of that through our cash holdings, but it's likely we're actually going to borrow for the first time," said Liddell. "It's going to be a mixture of the cash we have on hand plus debt."
Liddell said he expects Microsoft's revenue to grow at a double-digit percentage in the coming fiscal year starting in July despite a potential U.S. economic slowdown.
Microsoft also announced that its first major update to Windows Vista was released to manufacturing. Usually, large organizations wait for the first major update before deploying a new operating system.
Shares of Microsoft rose 5 cents to $30.50 in early Nasdaq trading, while Yahoo shares rose 44 cents to $28.82.