Ballmer: Yahoo acquisition won't happen
A change at the helm of Yahoo won't revive a Microsoft takeover offer, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said during the company's annual shareholders meeting on Wednesday.
A change at the helm of Yahoo won't revive a Microsoft takeover offer, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said during the company's annual shareholders meeting on Wednesday.
Yahoo and Google have revised the terms of their search advertising deal to ease concerns that have stalled its approval by the US Department of Justice, according to a report on the Wall Street Journal's Web site on Monday.
Yahoo will lay off at least 10% of its global staff before the end of the year, the company announced today along with disappointing financial results for its third quarter.
Microsoft said Thursday it is not pursuing an acquisition of Yahoo, despite public comments by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer Thursday suggesting a deal between the two companies might still be on the table.
Microsoft says it has raised the possibility of a new deal with Yahoo, one that may involve buying a part of the company but not all of it.
When Yahoo announced its Yahoo Open Strategy (Y OS), in late April, it offered a vision that, if realised, could give back the company the mojo it lost several years ago.
As its stock price plummets, Yahoo's executives must do something tangible, and do it quickly, to prove to shareholders that fighting a takeover bid by Microsoft was the right thing to do, analysts say.
— Going backwards
— Yebbut why?
— Who blinked?
Going backwards
Having ADSL2+ from Orcon was great. Imagine getting 20Mbit/s downloads over a phone line. No, seriously — I escaped all the problems that plagued the launch of Orcon's @Home service, and had the DSL line humming along rather nicely in Freemans Bay.
Orcon deserved the pat on the back from Communications Minister Cunliffe at the recent TUANZ Telecommunications Day, in my opinion.
Now however I've returned to the wondrous North Shore, to a non-LLU area. Due to some mix-ups that weren't anyone in particular's fault, there's no DSL in the house yet. I'm not sure how well it'll work either, as I believe the part I'm in is serviced via roadside cabinets. Here's hoping it won't be the ones with a meagre 2Mbit/s backhaul shared with all other customers.
Meanwhile, Vodafone's HSDPA worked really well at my place. Got full strength, which meant around 2.5Mbit/s downloads and the ususal 384kbit/s uploads. Telecom's T3G EV-DO Rev A doesn't seem to cover our house though, unusually enough, and only finds CDMA 1xRTT to lock onto. A couple of days ago though, something happened... now I'm lucky to get one bar of HSDPA and 120kbit/s downloads. The modem drops down to GPRS much of the time, and that particular connection alternative is painfully slow to use for anything beyond simple emailing.
I'm not sure what's going on with the 3G connections, but suspect the nearby roadworks are to blame. I'm guessing some access points have either been turned off or relocated.
I can see the magic black band on the Sky Tower, so maybe it's time to go back to wireless? I think Compass still has the Wired Country service running; it was very good and stable once the initial network issues had been ironed out, and I was quite happy with it. It's maxes out at 2Mbit/s down and 1Mbit/s up though, and it'd be nice to have something quicker in 2008.
A WiMax connection could be a faster alternative, but don't think anyone's beaming a signal towards the Shore, unfortunately.
Connection suggestions would be very welcome.
Microsoft and Yahoo have turned a corner and are finally negotiating in earnest about their possible merger, although a deal is far from imminent, according to media reports.
Does a Microsoft-Yahoo deal make sense? Probably. As separate companies, Microsoft and Yahoo duplicate systems and staff. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said a merger could save US$1 billion (NZ$1.26 billion) annually. According to industry observers, the time is right because Yahoo's stock is down, and the company hasn't improved its results even after co-founder Jerry Yang took over as CEO in the middle of last year. Plus, Microsoft's offer, initially 62% over Yahoo's share price, is a very good deal for Yahoo shareholders.
Still more changes to YahooXtra’s email are irritating users and forcing them to adjust their settings — this time confirming each individual email address used.
Microsoft still has its eye on Yahoo, but CEO Steve Ballmer would not say on Monday whether the company plans to pursue a proxy fight to remove Yahoo's board.
Yahoo is planning to open its Yahoo Search engine to allow third parties to add a wide variety of data to search results.
— Ring of Fibre
Yahoo may team up with News Corp to fend off Microsoft's bid to buy the struggling web portal, according to a Wall Street Journal report on Wednesday.