Long torn between whether it should focus on media content or on tools and technologies, Yahoo under Marissa Mayer is being positioned firmly in the latter camp, according to sources inside and outside the company.
Yahoo is facing a showdown with a major shareholder, activist hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb, who wants the troubled Internet company to fire CEO Scott Thompson for unethical conduct -- essentially, résumé inflation.
On Wednesday, Yahoo named Scott Thompson as CEO. He's a former PayPal president and veteran technologist -- and that's the trouble: Yahoo is following the same strategy that led it to hire Carol Bartz, who was ousted for failing to turn the company around.
Companies do the darndest things, and last week was no exception. Consider these recent surprises, blunders, and flat-out boneheaded moves, including: Talbots making like Yahoo and firing its CEO; Walmart returning to layaway financing; and digital recorder overkill from TiVo. (NO one watches that much telly.)
On Tuesday, Yahoo ousted embattled CEO Carol Bartz, potentially paving the way for media-savvy executive Ross Levinsohn to step in and lead the struggling Internet company. To date, some members of Yahoo's board are "very much impressed" with Levinsohn, according to one source.
Carol Bartz was CEO of Yahoo! until yesterday, when she was unceremoniously fired. During her three year-tenure, Bartz pushed the stock price up 6.6%. Now the online giant's shares have moved roughly the same amount on news of her departure. But the market didn't send shares of Yahoo! higher because Bartz is gone, but rather because of what may come next.
Yahoo's top ad executive in the Americas is resigning, as the Internet pioneer struggles to raise its flagging revenues. The move represents yet another high-profile departure from Yahoo, but that may not necessarily be a bad thing.
Carol Bartz has been running Yahoo for 18 months, and some investors are getting impatient. Revenue growth has been poor as Yahoo has been outpaced by the likes of Google and Facebook. If things don't improve soon, Bartz could be forced out.