jerry yang

Remember the Billionaire Carl Icahn? The limelight he tried to capture with Microsoft support? Guys, his game is not yet over! Icahn has opposed to sell part of Yahoo to former AOL Chief Executive Jonathan Miller. How will he as he is been fed by Microsoft? Read the full story

Yahoo! Announced last night that its chief executive officer and co-founder will step down. Jerry Yang, now 40 co-founded Yahoo along with David Filo during 1994. He had returned as the chief last year.

Yahoo has been struggling to stay alive during the recent years after Google attracted all of Yahoo’s loyal followers towards it. Yahoo, once holded dominion over the internet and during 2000 its shares peaked above $400. However, Yahoo slowly started to die after Google was launched and with Googles frequent innovative and creative products, Yahoo was just not able to meet the competition or keep the phase.

Yahoo also has plans to further reduce its workforce by 10 percent which would be 15,000 of its employees. It should also be noted that Yahoo had previously laid off 1000 employees in January this year.

Jerry Yang mentioned that “from founding this company to guiding its growth into a trusted global brand that is [indispensable] to millions of people, I have always sought to do what is best for our franchise.” He further added, “When the Board asked me to become CEO and lead the transformation of the Company, I did so because it was important to re-envision the business for a different era to drive more effective growth. Having set Yahoo! on a new, more open path, the time is right for me to transition the CEO role and our global talent to a new leader.”

Jerry Yang had replaced Terry S. Semel in June, 2007 stating that he would turn the companies future around as the company struggled to bring in revenues. However, Yang couldn’t live up to his promises. Yang was put to severe controversy when he was not ready to sell Yahoo to Microsoft for $33 million. Shareholders accused him stating he was too loyal to his company and dint have the heart to see it being sold to its rivalry.

Any onlooker who reads for the first time what is going on with Icahn, Microsoft and Yahoo can easily figure out that Icahn is being fed three times a day by Microsoft. The software giant is just using him for its own gain. This is a well planned puzzle that Microsoft has hosted. But are the shareholders so dumb to listen to the Mr. Nobody Icahn?

I feel Microsoft is acting similar to how America acted in the days of war. A decade back America supported Iraq against Iran. Few years after the war was over, Iraq was invaded by America itself. Wow! Doesn’t it sound similar?

It is so obvious that Steve Ballmer is using Carl Icahn to weaken Yahoo to get an at-ease best buy deal done. Even dummies can understand it. But how then do all the investors wag the tail exactly as Icahn does? May be Icahn is so clever to mesmerize the investors and could that be how a college dropout became a billionaire financier and a well-known private equity investor?

Carl Celian Ichan has a history of successful quests and deals by pressurizing or trapping the opponent. Now it’s Yahoo which he’s looking for. Microsoft could well have made a deal with him titled, “If you make it happen, then…” Icahn has now filed a definitive proxy statement nominating that a slate of nine directors should replace Yahoo’s current board members including CEO, Jerry Yang. But why? Is it just because they consider Yahoo is worth much more? Or is it because they are not happy that Yahoo, a once upon a time King is being sold out? What is wrong in that? What else did they do? Did they commit a crime?

Remember how he pressed the board for a seat in Motorola and how Icahn could make the deal with Lear Corporation. If not, you should be remembering at least how he pressured Medimmune Inc to consider takeover bids. If you do wag the tail like he does, then you should be aware.

If you are just a casual onlooker watching what’s going on in the arena, then join me to watch the game of dummies, wealthy mesmerizer, the rich giant and the once-a-king-now-a-poor-man.

Shares of Google dropped to $68.87 which is around 12% in just two trading days after the software giant Microsoft announced its interest to buy Yahoo Inc for a share of $31.

This in turn has made Google investors and executives not happy. Sources say, Google CEO Eric Schmidt has called up Yahoo! Inc CEO Jerry Yang to offer his support and help.

Yahoo! Co-founder and the fifth-biggest stakeholder lost half a billion dollars losing investor confidence with the company losing out to competitors and reduction of employees.

Jerry Yang took over as the search giant’s Chief Executive officer in June last year. With a 4 percent stock in Yahoo, Yang has been experiencing the pain in the reducing stock by about a third to $1 billion in the past seven months. Yahoo! further dropped 8.5% in the end of January 2008. The 39-year-old CEO along with his co-founder, David Filo got into the billionaire ranks in 1999 with Yahoo! shares rising up threefolds.