Microsoft Makes Its Yahoo! Play - Forbes.com

As Paul Harvey would say, "If you care, you have already seen the news" but since I want to use it in class, I will mention it here as well.


Microsoft Makes Its Yahoo! Play - Forbes.com:

"Microsoft, the world's biggest software company, is set to grow even bigger: it has offered to buy search engine Yahoo! for $44.6 billion, in a bid to rival Google and take a bigger slice of the online services market.

Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) is offering $31 for every Yahoo! (nasdaq: YHOO - news - people ) share, or a whopping 62% premium to the search engine's closing price on January 31. Shares in Yahoo! shot up 58.5%, or $11.22, to $30.40, in pre-market trading on Friday."

From NY Times:

"Microsoft’s $44.6 billion bid for Yahoo, pushed by Mr. Ballmer, was hostile. And during a conference call Friday with analysts and in a subsequent interview, he never once uttered the word “Google,” referring to the Internet search giant that has humbled Microsoft only as “the leader” in the online world....Microsoft’s bid for Yahoo is thus a tacit, and difficult, admission that the company did not get its online business right. The bid also represents a sharp departure from Microsoft’s well-thumbed playbook of building new businesses on its own."