Yahoo!

Yahoo! is an Internet service company providing news, email, a directory, and a web portal. Yahoo was founded by current CEO Jerry Yang and David Filo while the two were studying as graduate students at Stanford University. Prior to the advent of competing search engine Google, Yahoo! was the Web's most popular search engine. Yang announced his intention to step down as the company's CEO in November of 2008 following a chaotic period in which the company rejected a buyout offer from Microsoft.¹

Fast Facts

1. Ticker: YHOO (NASDAQ)
2. Incorporated in 1995
3. Headquartered: Sunnyvale, California
4. CEO: Jerry Yang (set to step down in 2008)
5. Sequoia Capital funded
6. Founders: Jerry Yang and David Filo
7. Rejected purchase offer by Microsoft for $44.6 billion
8. In 2000, used Google as default search engine
9. Rumor of Yahoo! buyout by former AOL CEO Jonathan Miller began circulating in December 2008²

Early On

The idea of the company was born when Yang started a web page with a listing of his favorite links. By the end of 1994, the website was renamed to "Yahoo!" based on the Jonathan Swift story, Gulliver's Travels. That same year, the company received 1 million unique visitors. A year later, on March 1, 1995, Yahoo! went public.

Yahoo from 2000-2008

At the height of the late 1990s, early 2000 tech bubble, Yahoo was trading in excess of $400 a share. It was also the only company to reach ¥100,000,000 in Japan at the time. In September 2001, Yahoo! stock had plummeted to an all-time low of approximately $4.00 a share. Since then the company has responded to heavy competition with Google by diversifying its product base, cutting internal costs, and making strategic partnerships (i.e. Verizon in 2005).

Potential Jonathan Miller Acquisition

The Wall Street Journal reported in December 2008 that former AOL CEO Jonathan Miller may be consulting with private equity and foreign wealth funds to raise money for a possible Yahoo! buyout. Miller is said to need to raise between $28 to $30 billion to accomplish a buyout.²

Potential Microsoft Acquisition

On February 1, 2008, Microsoft made an offer to purchase Yahoo! for $44.6 billion. However, this offer was declined by the company because the board felt that the offer was too low.

Nebraska Data Center Plans

Yahoo! plans to go ahead with a $100 million data center in Nebraska, despite the economic slump and the fact that 1500 workers were laid off from Yahoo!'s staff in October, 2008. The Nebraska data center would result in an additional 100 jobs.³

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