Yahoo!, MySpace, and Google today announced they have agreed to form the OpenSocial Foundation to ensure the neutrality and longevity of OpenSocial as an open, community-governed specification for building social applications across the web. Yahoo!’s support of OpenSocial and role as a founding member of the new foundation are landmarks for the rapidly growing specification which will now offer developers the potential to connect with more than 500 million people worldwide.
The OpenSocial Foundation will be an independent non-profit entity with a formal intellectual property and governance framework; related assets will be assigned to the new organization by July 1, 2008. The foundation will provide transparency and operational guidelines around technology, documentation, intellectual property, and other issues related to the evolution of the OpenSocial platform, while also ensuring all stakeholders share influence over its future direction.
“Yahoo! believes in supporting community-driven industry specifications and expects that OpenSocial will fuel innovation and make the web more relevant and more enjoyable to millions of users,” said Wade Chambers, Vice President – Platforms, Yahoo!. “Our support builds on similar efforts with the OpenID community and will expand the opportunity for developers and publishers to benefit from an open and increasingly social web.”
Source- Google press Release
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AOL and Yahoo! are said to have held talks as the search engine considers potential deals to help it evade the clutches of Microsoft.
Advisers from Time Warner-owned AOL met with representatives of search engine Yahoo! to see if a deal is workable, the Sunday Telegraph reported.
The talks with Internet firm AOL come after Yahoo!’s rejection last week of Microsoft’s offer to buy the company for 42 billion US dollars (£21.4bn).
Among the other suitors for Yahoo!, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation is thought to have offered to buy a 20% stake in Yahoo! in a deal that would see Yahoo! swap shares for a clutch of online assets, including social networking site MySpace. Mr Murdoch has ruled out making a full bid.
Details of the discussions involving AOL and Yahoo! remain unclear, although a potential sticking point could be Google’s small stake in AOL. Anti-trust laws would make any deal involving Google and either AOL or NewsCorp difficult, the newspaper report said.
Microsoft’s approach came a year after the two companies held talks over a possible tie-up to challenge Google, although Yahoo! rejected the proposals at the time because it hoped to reap benefits from an overhaul of the business.
But Microsoft warned on unveiling its offer that the competitive situation had not improved and that it believed a merger was the "only alternative" to challenging Google’s dominance.
The software giant wants to offer a credible alternative to Google through the tie-up, offering greater choice to advertisers, increasing research and development spending and stripping out overhead costs.
It has also hinted at a hostile bid by reserving the right "to pursue all necessary steps" to win over the firm’s shareholders if the deal is opposed.
Source: http://news.uk.msn.com/Article.aspx?cp-documentid=7558766
According to the the media reports published in The Tribune Media baron Rupert Murdoch is reportedly in talks with Internet major Yahoo! to merge with his MySpace online social networking site. Murdoch’s audacious move is aimed at derailing Microsoft’s attempt to buy the Yahoo, says The Telegraph.
The two sides are also in discussions about merging Yahoo with News Corporation’s other online properties. Under the deal being proposed, News Corporation would get a stake of more than 20 per cent in Yahoo.
News Corporation and an unnamed private equity firm would also inject cash into the deal. The two companies have been in talks several times over the past 18 months, and should the combination work, it would help Yahoo fend off Microsoft’s unsolicited takeover bid for over $ 44.6 billion.
Microsoft Corp. today issued the following statement in response to the announcement by Yahoo! Inc. that its Board of Directors has rejected Microsoft’s previously announced proposal to acquire Yahoo!:
It is unfortunate that Yahoo! has not embraced our full and fair proposal to combine our companies. Based on conversations with stakeholders of both companies, we are confident that moving forward promptly to consummate a transaction is in the best interests of all parties.
We are offering shareholders superior value and the opportunity to participate in the upside of the combined company. The combination also offers an increasingly exciting set of solutions for consumers, publishers and advertisers while becoming better positioned to compete in the online services market.
A Microsoft-Yahoo! combination will create a more effective company that would provide greater value and service to our customers. Furthermore, the combination will create a more competitive marketplace by establishing a compelling number two competitor for Internet search and online advertising.
The Yahoo! response does not change our belief in the strategic and financial merits of our proposal. As we have said previously, Microsoft reserves the right to pursue all necessary steps to ensure that Yahoo!’s shareholders are provided with the opportunity to realize the value inherent in our proposal.
On February 1, 2008, Microsoft announced a proposal to acquire all the outstanding shares of Yahoo! common stock for per share consideration of $31 representing a total equity value of approximately $44.6 billion and a 62 percent premium above the closing price of Yahoo! common stock based on the closing prices of the stocks of both companies on Jan. 31, 2008, the last day of trading prior to Microsoft’s announcement. Microsoft’s proposal would allow the Yahoo! shareholders to elect to receive cash or a fixed number of shares of Microsoft common stock, with the total consideration payable to Yahoo! shareholders consisting of one-half cash and one-half Microsoft common stock.
Source- Microsoft Press Release
As expected, Yahoo has officially rejected Microsoft’s $44.6 billion bid to acquire the company. In a press release issued By Yahoo this morning,this is what is actually written by Yahoo
Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO), a leading global Internet company, today said the Yahoo! Board of Directors has carefully reviewed Microsoft’s unsolicited proposal with Yahoo!’s management team and financial and legal advisors and has unanimously concluded that the proposal is not in the best interests of Yahoo! and our stockholders.
After careful evaluation, the Board believes that Microsoft’s proposal substantially undervalues Yahoo! including our global brand, large worldwide audience, significant recent investments in advertising platforms and future growth prospects, free cash flow and earnings potential, as well as our substantial unconsolidated investments. The Board of Directors is continually evaluating all of its strategic options in the context of the rapidly evolving industry environment and we remain committed to pursuing initiatives that maximize value for all stockholders.
Goldman, Sachs & Co., Lehman Brothers and Moelis & Company are acting as financial advisors to Yahoo!. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP is acting as legal advisor to Yahoo!, and Munger Tolles & Olson LLP is acting as counsel to the outside directors of Yahoo!.
The Times Online is reporting this evening that Yahoo is in talks with AOL on a merger. Yahoo! is seeking to restart merger talks with AOL as a means of defending itself against the $45 billion (£23 billion) hostile bid approach from Microsoft.
Here is something The Times Online says about Yahoo and AOL
…One option being explored is to restart merger talks with AOL, the online business owned by Time Warner. Although Yahoo! and AOL previously failed to join forces because of differences over price, it is hoped that the urgency created by an unwelcome approach from Microsoft and an impending economic downturn will spur the two into new talks. Google, which offered support to Yahoo! when the Microsoft approach was made public, also has a 5 per cent stake in AOL.
Now lets see what Microsoft has to say about this and even we had rumors that Yahoo is considering a deal with Google, but for now it’s sure that Yahoo is not going to merge with Microsoft as reported by us earlier today here
The Internet major Yahoo is likely to turn down the Microsoft Corp’s 44.6 billion takeover offer.The media is reporting this quoting an unnamed source.
The "San Francisco Chronicle" said the decision will be formally delivered to Microsoft in a letter to Microsoft on Monday. Yahoo’s 10-member boar4d ,which met on Friday to discuss the week old proposal,determined that the 31$ per-share was too low,source told the San Francisco Chronicle on condition of anonymity.
Microsoft has held out the possibility that it could undertake a hostile merger attempt if Yahoo’s Board members rejected the offer,the Daily has reported.But it might require Microsoft to unseat some of Yahoo’s board members,the report noted.
The Yahoo board is expected to meet this week also so we can expect more progressions in the issue.
Meanwhile the Wall Street Journal has said that Yahoo is unlikely to go for a hostile bid.
"Yahoo’s board appears to be betting that Microsoft doesn’t want to go hostile and try to acquire the company against the wishes of management and the board.such a course could cause deep resentment among the rank-and-file engineers whose Microsoft is crucial to it’s success" Pointed out the Wall street Journal.
Yahoo has quietly launched Yahoo live which the developer blog describes it as as “an experiment in personal live video broadcasting.”Here is what the blog reads-
We’re excited to share with you Yahoo! Live, a new experiment in live video from the Advanced Products team at Yahoo!. Y! Live was dreamed up as a way to make it possible for anyone to create their own live video experience. Broadcast the concert you’re at. Webcast your own live DJ set. Lifecast. Build your own live video speed dating application. We’ve created a website and an API that lets you do all these things and many more.
The first screen that we get is this-
which clearly shows that the site is in it’s initial stages and so we may hope more improvements in the coming weeks!!!!
Just take a look here http://live.yahoo.com/weknow.html
Ankur Mittal | March 26, 2008
Yahoo!, MySpace, and Google today announced they have agreed to form the OpenSocial Foundation to ensure the neutrality and longevity of OpenSocial as an open, community-governed specification for building social applications across the web. Yahoo!’s support of OpenSocial and role as a founding member of the new foundation are landmarks for the rapidly growing specification which will now offer developers the potential to connect with more than 500 million people worldwide.
The Times Online
