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Apple to save Yahoo! from Microsoft?

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 09:57 — Chauncey Dupree

The Scotsman throws it out there:

GLOBAL giants including Apple and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp are believed to be considering rival bids for the internet company Yahoo, which has received a $44.6bn (£22.6bn) offer from Microsoft.

The conglomerate InterActiveCorp was another company named as a potential bidder for Yahoo, which is said to be unwilling to give in to Microsoft without a fight.

After Microsoft's chief executive Steve Ballmer made the offer in a letter on Thursday, it emerged that Yahoo had rejected a similar takeover attempt by Ballmer's organization a year before.

Yahoo chief executive and co-founder Jerry Yang is understood not to be Microsoft's greatest fan, and would be prepared to line up another 'white knight' rather than concede to Ballmer.

It is believed he would be particularly open to a rescue bid from Steve Jobs' Apple Corp, having openly expressed his admiration for the firm in the past.

Apple does have a bit of cash laying around ($16 Billion) and Steve Jobs did pay the Yahoo! VPs a visit last year.  According to Kara Swisher, it was quite the motivational speech.  Steve Jobs also knows how to bring a company back from the brink of collapse (see Apple 1997).

Stranger things have happened - and the drive from Cupertino to Sunnyvale is a bit shorter than from Redmond - not to mention that the Valley culture is much stronger at Apple and Yahoo than at Microsoft.

Also, Apple has much less overlap in products and services than Microsoft does with Yahoo. 

The unlikely move however, would put Apple in direct competition with (Apple Board member) Eric Schmidt's Google, a partner and ally in its battle vs. a Microsoft dominated marketplace.

Other white Knights include InterActiveCorp, Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp (yikes!) and some foreign suitors.

Dinosaur Securities analyst David Garrity even thinks it’s possible that China’s search leader, Baidu.com Inc., or Chinese e-commerce conglomerate Alibaba.com Inc. might bid for Yahoo. Alibaba.com is 40 percent owned by Yahoo.  He also considers Apple a potential suitor.

 Still though.  Super-unlikely.

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Comments

Yahoo is not part of Apple's

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 11:17 — Jodeo (not verified)

Yahoo is not part of Apple's 'flywheel.'

An acquisition would bring Apple DOWN.

Dinosaur Securities analyst

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 11:23 — Anonymous Coward (not verified)

Dinosaur Securities analyst David Garrity is way off! Both Baidu.com and Alibaba.com had no such financial resources to bid for Yahoo! Not even to two added together!

Not going to happen. Apple

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 13:05 — Anonymous Coward (not verified)

Not going to happen. Apple isn't about to become anyones silent partner. What would Yahoo do for Apple? Nothing. Maybe generate some cash? Not likely.

Not to mention what would this mean for the iPhone and Apple's Google partnership. Sorry. you don't s**t where you eat, and Steve Jobs knows it.

Fat Asshole. We at Apple are

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 17:06 — Steve Jobs (not verified)

Fat Asshole.

We at Apple are not plainly a software company, we are also a hardware company. This is what makes us so great. Microsoft is a piece of shit. Lololololololololololo. And it is important for us to rescue one of our most important ally in the cloud/internet business and that is Yahoo!. So. Stop bitchin' and let me get this right. Viva La Applexorzz!!!!

-S.J

seriously?

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 17:22 — Anonymous Coward (not verified)

seriously?

I simply don't understand

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 23:45 — Anonymous Coward (not verified)

I simply don't understand how it is even possible for a company with "only" 16 billion to match or exceed three times that size, without mortgaging the entire game plan.

Just seems completely unlikley. The numbers are not there and the biz plan doesn't make sense.

But then, it doesn't make a lot of sense for MS to buy Y! either, as they have such different cultures yet overlap in several key areas... the only one who really might win is Google.

Does anyone else notice that

Mon, 02/04/2008 - 23:58 — Parker (not verified)

Does anyone else notice that Apple has 16B in the band and they need 45B to buy Yahoo? I don't think this is going to happen. It would be cool though!

 

 

The question is: what would

Tue, 02/05/2008 - 06:30 — MacBeutling (not verified)

The question is: what would be the benefit for Apple if they should decide to by Yahoo! ?
I am sure that if SJ would see a way of generating money through the acquisition of Yahoo! he would buy them at once.
But unless someone shows me this way, there will be no offer from Apple.

Never happen. There is

Tue, 02/05/2008 - 19:25 — EagerDragon (not verified)

Never happen.
There is little that Apple would want from Yahoo. This would also play badly with Google, not that Google and Apple are best friends since Google anounced Android.

Besides Apple does not have the cash to compete head to head with Micro$oft. Also M$ is not going to provide a vision or inovation that can compete with Google. Besides, if they can't make MSN sucessful, how can they make Yahoo sucessful? Also Yahoo is to my knowledge build on FreeBSD and M$ is likely going to try to move them to Windows.

Sorry I do not see this happening. M$ wants to spend all that money .... great let M$ shareholders cut Ballmer head off.

I'd rather Apple stay away

Wed, 02/06/2008 - 23:43 — Anonymous Coward (not verified)

I'd rather Apple stay away from Yahoo until they can at least figure out how to build a decent browser.

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