The board appears to be doing this more to protect their board seats and to get MS to go away rather than trying to get MS to raise their bid (which I think breaches those previously mentioned “Revlon duties”).

Quote from Jennifer - “Both companies are struggling, but any path I can see from here will end badly for all parties.” What planet are you on or should I say drugs?

Against industry trends and the constant parroting of naysayers like Jennifer Microsoft continues to grow and grow. Microsoft just recently posted 15% growth in Net revenue up from USD$44b to USD$51b and growth of 12% in Net income up from USD$12.6b to USD$14.1b. Apple dissappointed and so did Google but Microsoft beat all analyst expectations and the ignorant naysayers. Let’s see - Google is a one trick company - they have monetised search, nothing else. Apple - Mac OS only accounts for 3% of computers desktop operating systems and Linux 1% but you wouldn’t think so from all the anti Microsoft comments from people living in fairy land. Microsoft is the only constant in the business and they continue to grow!

Microsoft is not even remotely close to a company who does not continue to innovate, invest, acquire and deliver wanted products and technologies.

Linux was meant to be the death of Microsoft = Linux market share has been going backwards.

Microsoft has come from nowhere and is now considered one of the top 3 players in Business Intelligence - Gartner report. They are now also considered a leader in Unified Communications as well.

Microsoft invests USD$6.5b on R&D this year and it continues to make good and successful acquisitions. Examples - aQuantive, Danger (Mobile) and many many others.

The latest report of Open Source Office Apps and Google Apps see only 0.03% of US consumers switching to office apps in the cloud and against this Microsoft has posted record growth in Office sales.

More than 50m mobile phones with Windows Mobile are being shipped with growth of more than 300% per annum - how many iPhones were sold!? No comparison.

The board of directors of Yahoo! are legally bound to maximise value for their shareholders nothing else and the offer by Microsoft is the best option for the future of Yahoo!. Wall Street has already said they would support a bid up to $35 per share and anyone who thinks it won’t happen demonstrate their inability for rational thought.

So before you continue to make uniformed and ignorant comments - get some facts.

I haven’t written anything about the Yahoo!/Microsoft deal yet, but this post on TechCrunch sums up some of the problems nicely.
In short, Yahoo! still has some very popular properties, and this is one of the reasons Microsoft feels like the two …

You do realize they already handed it back to him (Yang)?

if msft can replace the board, game over.

if msft “suggested” pro-merger board members can’t get elected, then msft should count this as a loss and stop wasting time and money

you have to wonder how much of this is just coming down to ceo egos

jerry thinks he can “save” yahoo. why else would he put up such a fight? this is going beyond fiduciary responsibility. the law does not compel a firm to take a “scorched earth” approach.

ballmer wants something noteworthy on his resume. he has good profits on the books but i sense he wants something more singularly associated with him tenue. he has made it clear he wants this deal done…even in the face of msft losing so much value, you have to wonder why he is going on

* Get out now and make a new offer at $12/share in 18 months

Also. NEVER would google be allowed to buy another major search company!

Personally, I dont want this merger to go thru. Im a fan of Yahoo and dont want it to be handed to the monkeyboy

Winner: google as always!

So, they didn’t get Yahoo and they already lost $44B

I feel good

Yang will be out on his ass and all these poison pill maneuvers will be reversed.

I do believe Microsoft would make Yahoo kick ass.

While I agree that this will definitely hurt Microsoft in the near term, your analysis is not entirely correct here. Note that saying severance package cost of $1B-$3B wipes out the entire $1B in cost savings is not correct. The $1B+ savings is recurring, i.e. every year savings, not one-time. It’s impossible to assume when these severance packages will flow through, but you can be certain that they will all conclude by 24 months following closure of the deal…savings will remain $1B constant, assuming Microsoft actually gets these savings. Nonetheless I agree with most of what you say - it’s going to be near impossible for Yahoo to dig out of this hole.

Mike

Perhaps the whole thing was a ploy to get more of the key engineering resources at Yahoo to leave for Facebook and strengthen Microsoft’s investment there.

1. Get Yahoo into a long fight so that
a) their best employees leave (MS can hire them directly perhaps)
b) they lose their focus off Search, Mail, IM and Portal and of course their display business
c) their shareholders get upset with them
d) their share tanks

2. Bail out of the deal within 90 days, declaring that MS has decided that given YHOO/Yang’s irrational and irresponsible behaviour, MS has no longer interest in Yahoo’s assets

3. Declare instead that MS has decided to invest 50% of that amount - $20B in its own assets: Windows Live, MSN and future services/brands (Silverlight, etc.)

Results
A. Yahoo’s tanking. MS will take over 2nd place.
B. Google loses the opportunity to partner with a sinking Yahoo.
C. MS shareholders become happy and send the stock skyrocketing.

Microsoft is a software engineering company / software publishing company. MS needs to focus on its core software products.

Yahoo is a media publishing company.

If I were a MS shareholder, I would bail out.

Moreover, MS won’t be allowed (anti-trust) to do anything with Yahoo in the sense of integrating the brand in Windows.

This seems like a headache for MS, and an interesting valuation of Yahoo, considering MS’ valuation of Facebook.

Nate