ceos

Buzz Out Loud 855: The iPhone changes everything

On today's show, Brian Cooley announces that he's made the switch...I mean, the big switch. He bought an iPhone. The world briefly stopped rotating, and when it resumed, we laid down the smack on poor Jerry Yang, the Justice Department, the XM-Sirius merger, and subsequent channel flipping, and some poor guy who thought it was a good idea to call our show. Good times!

Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 855

Yahoo's Jerry Yang to step down, as a search for new CEO commences http://kara.allthingsd.com/20081117/yahoos-jerry-yang-to-step-down-as-a-search-for-new-ceo-commences/ Jerry Yang's entire memo … Read more

Yang: 'Time is right' for new leader

Timing is everything.

And, so, it should come as no surprise that Yahoo Chief Executive Jerry Yang feels the "time is right" for a new leader to guide the embattled Internet search pioneer. The company announced Monday that it has started a search to replace Yang as CEO.

Two weeks ago, Yahoo's proposed search advertising partnership with Google was abandoned, after federal antitrust regulators indicated they would challenge the deal. For Yahoo, that dealt a blow to its plans to generate as much as $800 million in additional revenue, and had served as a cornerstone to ward … Read more

Microhoo revisited: Would it be a search-only deal?

Updated at 9:47 a.m. PST, with details about the likelihood of any potential Yahoo overture to Microsoft.

If Yahoo wants to get Microsoft back to the negotiating table, it would do well to try the lure of a search-only deal--regardless of whether Jerry Yang is CEO.

That's the assessment from one influential Microsoft source.

"If Jerry was still CEO and called Steve tomorrow and said, let's talk about a search-only deal, I think Steve would listen," said the source. "Microsoft is open to a mutually beneficial search deal. But people are still lusting … Read more

Jerry's perfect. Jerry's our man. Jerry's gone.

Update at 9:12 a.m. PST: Editors note about the Dan Lyons' vanishing blog has been added.

Update at 10:20 a.m. PST: See below for image with full text of Lyons' blog.

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang is stepping down. My question: why did this take so !%!%!% long?

In Yang's letter to employees, he suggests that he's had an "ongoing dialogue with the board about succession timing." Yet surely the timing was right a year ago, and not necessarily now when Yang and the Yahoo board's intransigence in the face of Microsoft's offer and too-hopeful attempts to buddy up with Google have left the company in a shambles, with no suitors, a miserable stock price, and a bleak future.

Dan Lyons gets it right when he calls "foul" on the entire process in his blog:

Chairman Roy Bostock says it's the right time for this to happen. I only wish you could have been on the phone for my conversation just--what--a month ago, when the same Roy Bostock swore up and down to me that Jerry Yang wasn't going anywhere because he was absolutely the greatest leader the world has ever known. "Nobody knows this company better than Jerry Yang," said Roy. "Jerry is the right person to continue to lead Yahoo."...

The takeaway [from this and other misguided optimism about the Microsoft and Google deals]: Do not believe a word that Yahoo says. Ever.

(Editors note: Lyons' blog is suddenly unavailable on the Web. Valleywag, however, posted the entry in full on Monday night with a prediction that it might be taken down. Lyons is a technology columnist for Newsweek. Also, there is an image with the full text of the blog below.)

The race is on to find just the right candidate to helm the bloody stump that is Yahoo. But Yang has shepherded the destruction of so much company value, both in terms of stock price and in terms of employee morale, that asking a candidate to step in is like asking someone to parachute onto the Titanic.

This is bad for the good people that work at Yahoo, but it's also destructive to the open-source assets that Yahoo had begun to assemble, such as Hadoop and Zimbra. This won't be the first concern for Yahoo, but it's depressing to see so much potential die in the womb.

For the Zimbra folks, in particular, it's sad to see the exceptional work that they created get smudged with the weakening Yahoo brand.… Read more

Microsoft's D.C. lobbying sank Google-Yahoo deal, Jerry Yang

In theory, antitrust law helps foster competition. In reality, politically connected companies sometimes use it to bludgeon competitors and boost their own bottom line, as soon-to-be former Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang learned the hard way.

Yang had lent his prestige and the weight of his position to the proposed Google-Yahoo advertising deal, in part as an alternative to being gobbled up by Redmond, and in part as a way to get an easy $800 million a year in additional revenue.

When that proposed deal unceremoniously ended earlier this month--thanks to Microsoft's take-no-prisoners lobbying efforts in Washington, D.C., and … Read more

Yahoo's ultimate search: A new CEO

With the Monday evening announcement that Jerry Yang would step down as its chief executive, Yahoo's search for his replacement will not only be closely watched by its investors but also by the folks at Microsoft, according to sources.

In part, two people industry players and headhunters point to as possible good fits already have Redmond running through their veins. One is former Microsoft online and Windows chief Kevin Johnson, who recently left to take a CEO post at Juniper Networks, and the other is Brian McAndrews, senior vice president of Microsoft's Advertiser and Publisher Solutions Group, who … Read more

Yang's travails: A Yahoo timeline

After nearly a year and a half at Yahoo's helm, Chief Executive Jerry Yang will step down once the company finds a replacement. Monday's announcement starts closing a chapter in the Internet pioneer's history that began in June 2007 when Yang replaced Terry Semel as CEO.

It's been a rough time. Yahoo's stock has dropped from $28.12 when Yang took over as CEO to Monday's close at $10.63.

But though Yang didn't build Yahoo into a Google-slayer, he hasn't been idle, either. The company looks very different from when he … Read more

A pity for Yahoo that John McCain didn't win

Unfortunately for Yahoo, Barack Obama's otherwise engaged.

As headhunters from Heidrick & Struggles scroll through the available A-listers for Yahoo's next CEO, they might be excused for secretly wishing John McCain had won the election.

That's because after all this company has gone through, it is going to take some sort of superstar to rally the troops now that Jerry Yang is returning to his former role of "chief Yahoo."

Truth be told, you should be happy for Yang. He no longer has to suffer the indignity of playing the role of human pinata. I … Read more

With Yang out, Microsoft may come back

Updated 8:29 p.m. PST with analyst comment.

Jerry Yang's resignation as chief executive of Yahoo opens the door wide for another Microsoft offer, several sources said Monday.

"I would expect Microsoft to come back within the next three or four months," said Eric Jackson, an activist Yahoo shareholder who was among the investors angry with Yahoo's management for not accepting Microsoft's previous bid. "I think Microsoft will come back because Microsoft needs Yahoo, despite what they've been saying publicly, and I think they know that," Jackson added.

Financial analysts also … Read more