Yahoo Inc’s new CEO is a straight-shooting

14.01.09 - Technology - Author: asia news ia - Comments: (0)

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc’s new CEO is a straight-shooting, tough-talking technology veteran but she is seen lacking two qualifications investors hoped for most: deal-making savvy and Web business know-how.

Carol Bartz was appointed to the top job at Yahoo on Tuesday after a two-month search, and brings with her a strong track record of revenue growth at software company Autodesk Inc, where she was chief executive from 1992 to 2006 and still remains executive chairman.

Bartz, however, does not have an established reputation as a deal-maker and Yahoo investors regarded her appointment skeptically, with shares of the Internet search and advertising company dropping more than 3 percent during the trading day.

“People respect her. She is direct and focused, but not mean-spirited like a ‘Chainsaw Al’ type of person,” said Needham & Co analyst Richard Davis, who covered Autodesk when Bartz was at its helm.

She is credited with increasing Autodesk’s revenue from $285 million to $1.5 billion during her 14-year tenure, as well as diversifying its business. Bartz, 60, built the company by buying small and medium-sized businesses, including a $444 million buyout of Discreet Logic in 1999.

“She seems to me to be more of a builder than a buyer-and-flipper,” Davis said. “I’m sure that plenty of people wanted to buy Autodesk over the years.”

Analysts lauded her for being a dextrous, capable and committed executive, but said that without any experience in the Internet sector, she would likely find it daunting to turn around Yahoo, which is a distant second to Google Inc in the search advertising market.

Bartz will be under immediate pressure from investors, who have seen the value of their shares nosedive in the past year, to re-open talks with Microsoft Corp and secure a sale of the company at a healthy premium. The software maker has shown no interest in reviving its $47.5 billion takeover bid.

Bartz herself welcomed the challenge during her first conference call as Yahoo CEO, saying she wouldn’t have accepted the offer if she didn’t think a turnaround was possible.

“I just see this company as a company with enormous assets that frankly could use a little management, and I love leading, love managing, love making decisions,” she said.

She added that she would address questions of whether Yahoo should look for a search partnership, divest assets and find new ways to cut costs later, after she had spent some time understanding the company.

DEAL OR NO DEAL

Collins Stewart analyst Sandeep Aggrawal said Microsoft could see Bartz’s appointment as an opportunity to make a fresh proposal for Yahoo.

“Yahoo probably needed a CEO who was going to favor this deal,” Aggrawal said. “We were never really sure whether Jerry Yang wanted to do this (Microsoft search) deal or not.”

Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang agreed to step down from his CEO post in November after drawing investor ire for failing to strike a deal with Microsoft.

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TV prepared to handle the Internet

07.01.09 - Technology - Author: asia news ia - Comments: (0)

The Internet has proven it can handle television, but is TV prepared to handle the Internet?

For years, technology companies have tried in vain to bring the Internet onto the screen at the centre of North American living rooms. Although TV shows have made the migration to the Web, to date, it has been a one-way road.

Now, a new breed of Internet-connected televisions is threatening to shake up both the technology and broadcasting industries while making millions of recently purchased high-definition TVs yesterday’s news.

Although the migration of the Internet to television could prove a boon for online video services, chip makers and television manufacturers, the new reality, if successful, could also bring about tough new challenges for cable companies and purveyors of set-top boxes.

Yesterday, LG Electronics Inc. unveiled a new line of high-definition TVs at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas that will include software from Netflix Inc. - the largest U.S. mail-order movie service - to allow users to download movies and television programs directly to their TVs over an Internet connection.

Sony Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. have been selling Internet-enabled televisions for a few years now, but users have been reluctant to adopt the technology simply because there wasn’t much worth watching.

“They weren’t offering much to go with that connection,” said James McQuivey, principal analyst at technology research firm Forrester Research Group. “Whereas now LG can walk in and say they will give you Internet connectivity so that they can give you Netflix, and it finally starts to make sense to people.”

Also yesterday, Yahoo Inc. announced a deal with Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. that will see a new line of the South Korean electronics company’s televisions come prepackaged with the Internet trailblazer’s Widget Engine software, which will allow users to access various services such as the Flickr photo-management application and Yahoo Finance through a launch bar running across the bottom of the screen, similar to a news ticker.

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