Yahoo sends letter to shareholders over Microsoft bid
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Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang cited the growing online advertising market and his company&#39;s position to take advantage of that growth as reasons for shareholders to&#160;reject Microsoft&#39;s acquisition bid, he said in a letter to shareholders Wednesday.The letter, the contents of which Yahoo made public Wednesday, stated that&#160;Microsoft&#39;s February 1, $44.5 billion unsolicited takeover offer&#160;was too low. Yang said that Yahoo is the most visited site in the United States, held the top position in online display advertising, and counted almost one out of two of the world&#39;s Internet users as its members. He also said Yahoo is the top mobile destination in the U.S.Yang did not cite sources for most of his claims. However, comScore Networks research from November 2007 confirmed Yahoo&#39;s online display advertising leadership, with almost 19 percent of the market.The online ad market is expected to grow from $45 billion last year to $75 billion in 2010, Yang said, and that Yahoo wanted &quot;to take advantage of what we see as a unique window of time in the growth -- and evolution -- of this market to build market share and to create value for stockholders.&quot;The company plans to grow visits to its properties &quot;by 15 percent per year over the next several years,&quot; although did not specify how. He also said that Yahoo&#39;s own search marketing system,&#160;Panama, along with two 2007 acquisitions -- Right Media and Blue Lithium -- would &quot;complement and enhance Yahoo!&#39;s existing capabilities and will make it easier for advertisers and online publishers to buy and sell advertising online.&quot;Both Yahoo and Microsoft have struggled to compete with Google&#39;s success in online advertising, specifically its paid search and Adwords programs. Based on the same comScore data, Microsoft captured only 6.7 percent of online display ads. That poor performance is seen as the main impetus behind its move for Yahoo.The letter made no mention of&#160;talks with News Corp.&#160;for some sort of share swap, intended either to offset Microsoft&#39;s interest or force the software company to boost its bid for Yahoo, as reported late Wednesday in The Wall Street Journal.
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Blog: Yahoo shareholders reject censorship, executive pay proposals, re-elect all board members at shareholder meeting
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Yahoo&#39;s Chairman Roy Bostock is leading a group of the company&#39;s board members in favor of accepting&#160;Microsoft&#39;s unsolicited $44.6 billion takeover bid,&#160;according to a new report.The informal group headed by Bostock also includes other board members and billionaire investor Ron Burkle, according to the report in the New York Post, which quoted unnamed sources close to the situation. Board members Eric Hippeau, a managing partner at Softbank Capital, and Robert Kotick, CEO of Activision Publishing, are standing behind Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, who does not want to accept Microsoft&#39;s offer.On Monday,&#160;Yahoo&#39;s board rejected Microsoft&#39;s offer,&#160;saying it undervalued the company.According to the Post, the discord revolves around Yang and his followers who are so opposed to selling the company to Microsoft that Bostock and his group fear they will act out of emotions rather than their fiduciary duty to Yahoo shareholders. Such an action could expose the board to lawsuits by shareholders.Yang sent a letter to shareholders&#160;Wednesday night, saying that Microsoft&#39;s bid substantially undervalues the company and that Yahoo is positioned to take advantage of growth in the online advertising market.Yahoo could not be reached for comment.Computerworld is an InfoWorld affililate.
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Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer rebuffed&#160;Google&#39;s accusations&#160;that an acquisition of Yahoo would be anticompetitive.The bid was made public Friday, prompting the response from Google over the weekend. Ballmer Monday at a news conference ceded ground to Microsoft&#39;s arch rival in order to justify his company&#39;s&#160;$44.6 billion cash-and-stock offer for Yahoo,&#160;which if accepted would fall under the scrutiny of U.S. and European regulators.&quot;Google&#39;s clearly got a dominant position,&quot; Ballmer said. &quot;They have about 75 percent of paid search worldwide. We think this enhances competition and anything else would be less good.&quot;A Google executive struck back at Microsoft on Sunday, charging that a combined Microsoft and Yahoo would control an overwhelming share of e-mail and instant-messaging accounts as well as portal traffic.David Drummond, senior vice president of corporate development and chief legal officer at Google, further suggested that if Microsoft buys Yahoo it might try to unfairly use its dominance in those areas, just as it did in the PC market.Monday&#39;s news conference, in which Ballmer spoke with Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell, appeared to put further pressure on Yahoo&#39;s board to accept the offer, which at $31 a share represents a 62 percent premium over Yahoo&#39;s closing price last Thursday.&quot;We think it&#39;s an extremely competitive offer,&quot; Liddell said.In a Monday filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Yahoo disclosed an e-mail sent on Friday by CEO Jerry Yang and Roy Bostock, non-executive chairman of Yahoo&#39;s board. &quot;First, we want to emphasize that absolutely no decisions have been made and, despite what some people have tried to suggest, there&#39;s certainly no integration process under way,&quot; the e-mail read.Ballmer continued with a hard push as to how a deal with Yahoo will let Microsoft move faster in building out areas such as search, online services and online advertising.&quot;We are going to have to innovate like crazy,&quot; Ballmer said.But he also stressed how long it could take for a Yahoo deal to eventually benefit shareholders. Ballmer said he looks at whether investments will pay off five to 10 years down the line, but investors often want to see results in three years.&quot;Sometimes those investments look smart, sometimes it takes a while for them to pay off,&quot; Ballmer said.
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Fingers in both pies !!!!! Some of Yahoo!'s institutional investors are keen for the proposed Microsoft takeover to go ahead, not because they're pleased with the offer price but because they own shares in both Microsoft and Yahoo!.â¦
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Yahoo Inc's board of directors is to meet on Friday to discuss Microsoft Corp's $44.6 billion buyout offer, the TechCrunch blog said, citing unnamed sources.
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With Yahooâs shares up slightly on the news that its board has officially rejected the $31 a share bid from Microsoft, it appears investors are betting the company is looking for a better deal.
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SANTA CLARA, California  - Shareholders at the annual meeting of Yahoo Inc.  voted down proposals to control executive pay and challenging the company's human rights policies in China, a supervisor of the votes said on Tuesday.
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Most of Yahoo Inc's top institutional shareholders may be more interested in making sure Microsoft Corp does not overpay for the Web pioneer, because they have more money invested in the bigger software maker, a research report said on Friday.
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Yahoo Inc. has formally rejected Microsoft Corp.'s $44.6 billion takeover bid as inadequate
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Yahoo has not reached a decision about&#160;Microsoft&#39;s acquisition offer&#160;and is considering &quot;a wide range of potential strategic alternatives,&quot; Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang said in an e-mail to employees on Wednesday.In the e-mail, which was addressed to &quot;yahoos&quot; and filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Yang said the Yahoo board is still reviewing the deal and will &quot;take the time it needs to do it right.&quot;&quot;Our board is thoughtfully evaluating a wide range of potential strategic alternatives in what is a complex and evolving landscape,&quot; he wrote in the e-mail, typed in all lowercase letters.Microsoft made its unsolicited bid for Yahoo last Friday, offering to pay $44.6 billion for the company, or 62 percent over Yahoo&#39;s closing share price Thursday. The deal would greatly expand Microsoft&#39;s search and advertising business and could help it to compete better with Google online.Yahoo is understood to be lukewarm on the offer. The company hopes a rival suitor will emerge with a counteroffer or that it can forge a deal with Google that will allow it to remain independent, according to Wednesday&#39;s Wall Street Journal newspaper, which cited unnamed sources.However, analysts have said it is unlikely another company could match Microsoft&#39;s sizeable offer, and a business deal between Yahoo and Google could raise antitrust concerns because of Google&#39;s already dominant market position.In the e-mail, Yang thanked the Yahoo staff for staying focused on their work amid the turmoil. The company has hired &quot;top advisors&quot; to assist it through the process and is focused on maximizing value for its shareholders, he said.
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Yahoo Inc's  board  believes Microsoft Corp's  unsolicited bid of $44.6  billion to acquire Yahoo "massively undervalues" the company  and directors are set to reject the offer, the Wall Street  Journal reported on Saturday, citing an unnamed source.
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Microsoft Corp.  wants to  block an effort for a shareholder vote forcing the world's  largest software maker to explain its support for Internet  network neutrality, according to a company letter obtained by  Reuters on Tuesday.
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CEO Jerry Yang explains to shareholders why Yahoo rejected Microsoft's acquisition bid.
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Yahoo said Monday that the board of directors, in consultation with financial and legal advisors, has concluded that Microsoft's US$44.6 billion [b] bid for the company is not in its best interests.
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Yahoo Inc's  board of  directors is to meet on Friday to discuss Microsoft Corp's   $44.6 billion buyout offer, the TechCrunch blog said,  citing unnamed sources.
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Yahoo&#39;s Chairman Roy Bostock is leading a group of the company&#39;s board members in favor of accepting&#160;Microsoft&#39;s unsolicited $44.6 billion takeover bid,&#160;according to a new report.