Will Yahoo! Accept Microsoft’s offer?
After years of speculation, Microsoft has finally jumped in with what seems to be an offer too good to be true. The offer of $42 Billion which is 60% above the current share value makes it pretty serious and it doesn’t leave much room for a counter.
I’d be extremely surprised if Yahoo! turns this down, though in some ways I hope they do.
For many people in the advertising and marketing space, the partnership could provide a plausible contender for Google. And at least on paper the numbers add up. But if all we can expect is increased market share based purely on combining their current capital then I’m worried.
Capitalising trough integration is a big job, and I really hope at least Yahoo’s resent plans get some airtime. I had little faith in Microsoft’s search engine or their advertising product, and apart from the maps and video, I wasn’t sure if they really should have bothered entering this space in the first place.
Yahoo! is a different story, no one could deny their heritage and while they may have been spanked by Google, they have a strong userbase and social assets including flikr and delicious. It was a matter of bringing all this together – and over the last few months I believe they’ve making all the right noises for a comeback. I really hope we still get to see some of their ideas come to fruition.
Anything that reduces choice for the end user is got to be a bad thing unless we get some real innovation. I’m not holding my breath for that.
Did you enjoy this post? Why not leave a comment below and continue the conversation, or subscribe to my feed and get articles like this delivered automatically to your feed reader.
Comments
No comments yet.
Leave a comment