Marissa Mayer, Yahoo’s under-pressure chief executive, vowed not to step down and said she was “convinced” the internet company was on the “right path”, despite scrapping a 10-month plan to spin off its $32bn stake in Alibaba.
The 40-year-old defended the group’s decision to halt a move to place Yahoo’s 15pc stake in the Chinese e-tailer in a separate company - called Aabaco - claiming the plan would take too long and create too much uncertainty.
Yahoo, which is best known for its search engine, said it will look at a so-called “reverse spin-off” instead. This will see the company’s core assets transferred to a newly-formed company, with the Alibaba stake left behind. The move will create two, separate, publicly-traded companies.
Crucially, it is not expected to incur the massive tax bill that was attached to the Alibaba proposal.
“Among other factors, we were concerned about the market’s perception of tax risk, which would have impaired the value of Aabaco stock until resolved,” Maynard Webb, Yahoo’s chairman, said.
Ms Mayer added to CNBC that “it’s really a question around timing of the resolution [of the potential tax bill], which could take multiple years”.
However, the reverse spin-off could take a similar amount of time, and potentially leave the door open for a rival to buy parts or all of Yahoo.
Mr Webb said on Wednesday that although Yahoo had a “fiduciary obligation” to talk to bidders, “we are not proactively trying to do any of that”.
Earlier this week, Verizon Communications chief executive Lowell McAdam said he could be interested in snapping up Yahoo assets if they were put up for sale.
Mr McAdam, who recently bought faded internet firm AOL for $4.4bn, told CNBC: “Once they make a decision, there might be assets that would fit together with AOL.” Meanwhile, activist investor Starboard Value has pushed for Yahoo to sell its core business, which has a market capitalisation of more than $30bn. That added further pressure on Ms Mayer, who moved from rival Google to take over the top job at Yahoo in 2012. Since then sales have fallen from $4.5bn to $4.4bn in 2014, with a lower figure expected for this year.
Mr Webb publicly backed Ms Mayer on Wednesday, saying he has “never met anybody who works harder, that’s smarter and cares more” about Yahoo.
Ms Mayer said she had "no intention of stepping down".
Read more at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/12042210/Yahoo-chief-executive-Marissa-Mayer-vows-not-to-step-down-despite-Alibaba-U-turn.html
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