We all knew it was coming. On Friday the ailing tech company announced the creation of “a Strategic Review Committee of independent directors” to explore “strategic alternatives.” In layman’s terms, they’ve hired a bunch of bankers, lawyers and other white collar employees to field offers that can be presented to the company’s board of directors.
It’s been a tough couple of months for the Sunnyvale, California based company; in December they announced the closure of all their Dubai based offices after insisting that they weren’t selling their core businesses, as some investors hoped. Despite the gloomy times, Yahoo and its CEO still have no plans to sell it’s core web advertising business, contrary to hopes of activist investors. Unfortuantely, that same web advertising platform hasn’t remained unschated, as it too suffered due to its efforts to grow into mobile and video bearing no fruit.
Yahoo had propped itself up when it made an investment in Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce company, grabbing a sizeable stake in its assets while the company was still private. The stake serves as an incentive for possible investors looking to invest by proxy into the e-commerce company. However Alibaba has long since become a publicly traded company with its IPO debuting in September of 2014. As a result Yahoo has been scrambling for a way to sell its stake in order to return money to shareholders.
Maynard Webb, chairman of the board of Yahoo, said that the company is looking at this strategy, noting it could be the best thing for Yahoo shareholders. Investors tepidly agreed, sending Yahoo shares up 1.7%.
“We believe that pursuing these complementary paths is in the best interests of our shareholders and will maximize value.”
– Maynard Webb, Chairman of the board of Yahoo.
Source: Mashable
