Microsoft Corp. has pounced on slumping Internet icon Yahoo Inc. with an unsolicited takeover offer of $44.6 billion in its boldest bid yet to challenge Google Inc.'s dominance of the lucrative online search and advertising markets.
With its profits steadily sliding, Yahoo's stock slipped to a four-year low earlier this week and a new management team has been trying to steer a turnaround but sees more turbulence through 2008.
The announcement lifted Yahoo's share price by almost 50 percent in morning trading, while Google fell more than 8 percent, dragged down by a fourth-quarter earnings report that missed Wall Street expectations.
Microsoft views Yahoo as its best chance to thwart Google, which has leveraged its leadership in Internet search and advertising to emerge as an increasingly serious threat to the world's largest software maker's persuasive influence on how people interact with computers.
The fate of Yahoo's brand also is unclear if Microsoft takes over. Both Ballmer and Kevin Johnson, president of Microsoft's platforms and services division, hailed Yahoo's strong brand value but didn't commit to keeping the name alive.
Friday, February 1, 2008
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Yahoo to lay off hundreds
After seven months as chief executive, Yahoo Inc. co-founder Jerry Yang has concluded hundreds of employees will have to be fired to help the slumping Internet icon recover from years of misguided management.
Yang and his management team already have committed to jettisoning at least several hundred jobs to help boost Yahoo's profits and placate investors demanding more action to reverse a steep decline in the company's stock price.
Securities analysts are betting Yahoo will trim its 14,000-employee payroll by about 5 percent — or 700 workers. If that many people are dumped, Yahoo could save about $100 million, JP Morgan analyst Imran Khan estimated in a Tuesday note.
From Wall Street's perspective, the layoffs are long overdue. Through September, Yahoo generated just under $364,000 per employee, well below an average of nearly $565,000 per employee at six other major Internet companies, including Google Inc. and eBay Inc., Khan calculated.
Yang and his management team already have committed to jettisoning at least several hundred jobs to help boost Yahoo's profits and placate investors demanding more action to reverse a steep decline in the company's stock price.
Securities analysts are betting Yahoo will trim its 14,000-employee payroll by about 5 percent — or 700 workers. If that many people are dumped, Yahoo could save about $100 million, JP Morgan analyst Imran Khan estimated in a Tuesday note.
From Wall Street's perspective, the layoffs are long overdue. Through September, Yahoo generated just under $364,000 per employee, well below an average of nearly $565,000 per employee at six other major Internet companies, including Google Inc. and eBay Inc., Khan calculated.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Oracle Buys BEA Systems for $8.5b
Software developer Oracle (oracle.com) and business software provider BEA Systems (bea.co) announced on Thursday that Oracle will buy BEA Systems for approximately US$8.5 billion, or $19.375 per share, reports PC World (pcworld.com).
The two companies have been in talks since last year. In October, BEA's board of directors rejected an initial offer from Oracle of $17 per BEA share, saying that it "significantly undervalues BEA." Oracle would then dismiss the BEA board's counteroffer of $21 per share as "impossibly high". The companies agreed on Wednesday to split the difference.
"This deal is a very big step toward completing our vision of becoming the strategic enterprise software vendor of choice," said Oracle CEO Larry Ellison during a conference call Wednesday. "Simply stated, this combination of BEA gets us where we need to be... across the software stack, in more verticals and more regions across the world."
The majority of BEA customers are already Oracle customers, according to Ellison, who said Oracle plans to "support BEA products in a manner similar to other acquisitions". Meanwhile, BEA chairman and CEO Alfred Chuang said that officials from both companies will collaborate on a full integration plan in the coming months.
The two companies have been in talks since last year. In October, BEA's board of directors rejected an initial offer from Oracle of $17 per BEA share, saying that it "significantly undervalues BEA." Oracle would then dismiss the BEA board's counteroffer of $21 per share as "impossibly high". The companies agreed on Wednesday to split the difference.
"This deal is a very big step toward completing our vision of becoming the strategic enterprise software vendor of choice," said Oracle CEO Larry Ellison during a conference call Wednesday. "Simply stated, this combination of BEA gets us where we need to be... across the software stack, in more verticals and more regions across the world."
The majority of BEA customers are already Oracle customers, according to Ellison, who said Oracle plans to "support BEA products in a manner similar to other acquisitions". Meanwhile, BEA chairman and CEO Alfred Chuang said that officials from both companies will collaborate on a full integration plan in the coming months.
Friday, January 4, 2008
SEOmeter.com Unveils Their New Google Crawl Tool
SEOmeter.com has officially announced the launch of their new website and SEO tool, which can gauge the importance of any website in the Google search engine.
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the art of ranking well in search engines for any given keyword term. While the methods webmasters use to rank well for their terms can vary greatly from one person to the next, webmasters everywhere are on a constant search for any kind of tool which can give them an edge.
SEOmeter is offering their service for a small yearly fee, and in return they monitor how often and what time of day Google visits a site. While some newer webmasters may not immediately recognize the importance of such a tool, seasoned veterans are jumping at the chance to use it.
"How often a search engine visits and crawls website content is an often neglected, but important metric for search engine optimization," said site creator Peter Chang. "A search engine's crawling rate can be quantified by its crawling cycle (CC), which is the time between two consecutive crawls by a search engine robot. A short CC usually means that the website is 'trusted' by search engines, and this trust, in turn, is reflected on the website's search engine ranking."
Knowing how often Google visits a site can help webmasters better determine which methods work and which do not. By allowing SEOmeter to monitor this statistic, users can spend more time on other aspects of SEO.
About SEOmeter.com
SEOmeter.com offers a convenient on-line SEO tool that allows webmasters to monitor their website's crawling activities, and to collate crawling trends against their ongoing marketing campaign and other SEO strategies.
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the art of ranking well in search engines for any given keyword term. While the methods webmasters use to rank well for their terms can vary greatly from one person to the next, webmasters everywhere are on a constant search for any kind of tool which can give them an edge.
SEOmeter is offering their service for a small yearly fee, and in return they monitor how often and what time of day Google visits a site. While some newer webmasters may not immediately recognize the importance of such a tool, seasoned veterans are jumping at the chance to use it.
"How often a search engine visits and crawls website content is an often neglected, but important metric for search engine optimization," said site creator Peter Chang. "A search engine's crawling rate can be quantified by its crawling cycle (CC), which is the time between two consecutive crawls by a search engine robot. A short CC usually means that the website is 'trusted' by search engines, and this trust, in turn, is reflected on the website's search engine ranking."
Knowing how often Google visits a site can help webmasters better determine which methods work and which do not. By allowing SEOmeter to monitor this statistic, users can spend more time on other aspects of SEO.
About SEOmeter.com
SEOmeter.com offers a convenient on-line SEO tool that allows webmasters to monitor their website's crawling activities, and to collate crawling trends against their ongoing marketing campaign and other SEO strategies.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Ebay is taking over
Ebay is no longer has just an auction website. Now they are also ticket brokers,half off shopping,free classifieds,ending poverty,online merchants,ecommerce store sellers,apartment rental agency,internet phone calls with skype and social bookmarking.
The Ebay companies:
Half.com
Kijiji
MicroPlace
PayPal
ProStores
Rent.com
Shopping.com
Skype
StubHub
StumbleUpon
I'm a member of Stumble Upon and I had no idea Ebay owned this company. Ebay also sells thousands of concert tickets with their online ticket broker website,stubhub.com.
The Ebay companies:
Half.com
Kijiji
MicroPlace
PayPal
ProStores
Rent.com
Shopping.com
Skype
StubHub
StumbleUpon
I'm a member of Stumble Upon and I had no idea Ebay owned this company. Ebay also sells thousands of concert tickets with their online ticket broker website,stubhub.com.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Google's Supplemental Index Announcement Drives More Confusion
The Ultimate Fate of Supplemental Results from the Google Webmaster Central blog announces, what Google calls, the "next major milestone" for Google's supplemental results. What is happening exactly? Google is implying that when you conduct a search in Google.com, Google will not just search their main index, but also search the "supplemental index" to return results from both indexes, dare I say it, equally. Or at least, that is how I understand it.
Google Adds "Content Analysis" To Webmaster Central
In an effort to help site owners address some of the basics of code based SEO for better indexing, Google has introduced "Content Analysis" into Webmaster Central.
Google Webmaster Central is a great resource for any website owner focused on their Google listings and rankings. This latest addition will provide some great foundation insights into the way Google is viewing the Meta Data and content of your web pages.
While the information provided may not be overly valuable to webmasters who are quite advanced with their SEO, it is a handy tool for less savvy site owners, especially considering the impact such elements have on Google's indexing and ranking of sites
Google Webmaster Central is a great resource for any website owner focused on their Google listings and rankings. This latest addition will provide some great foundation insights into the way Google is viewing the Meta Data and content of your web pages.
While the information provided may not be overly valuable to webmasters who are quite advanced with their SEO, it is a handy tool for less savvy site owners, especially considering the impact such elements have on Google's indexing and ranking of sites
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)