Yahoo’s earnings call Tuesday could reveal future of the company
Heralded as “one of the most prominent women in Silicon Valley and corporate America,” when she took over Yahoo 2½ years ago, Marissa Mayer is about to find out how tough it can be now that the shine has worn off.
Mayer has also promised to say how she will “monetize” the asset that has helped keep her company afloat — Yahoo’s stock in the $243 billion Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba.
Not doing it in the way rebellious shareholders want her to will be “a clear indication to us that significant leadership change is required at Yahoo,” some investors warned.
Often the public face of Google, she’s been a member of Fortune’s 50 Most Powerful Women in Business since 2008, and was greeted at Yahoo with a giant banner with her face and the word HOPE.
[...] through it all, Mayer has been operating under what Carlson’s book aptly labels “air cover” — a 40 percent stake in Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba, since reduced to 15 percent, worth approximately $37 billion.
[...] hiring Google colleague Henrique de Castro as chief operating officer for the princely sum of $62 million, then firing the largely ineffectual executive in charge of advertising 15 months later.
The billions spent on acquisitions of social media companies (Tumblr for $1 billion), content aggregators, video platforms, gaming sites, TV shows (most recently “Community,” dropped by NBC), hiring Katie Couric as a “global anchor” (for a reported $6 million a year) and former New York Times tech columnist David Pogue to front Yahoo Tech, have so far shown little in return financially.
Mayer wants Yahoo to become a major media player, evidenced by reports she was interested in buying CNN and Scripps Networks Interactive — the owner of several cable channels, including HGTV and the Food Channel.
Or, Mayer could choose an alternative method of financial and tax engineering — “a cash-rich split-off.”
“The resurfacing of rumors about a cash-rich split-off at this juncture is particularly troubling given your acknowledgment at our meeting with you on October 27th that this option would be clearly inferior,” Smith wrote to Mayer.