Three top Yahoo Inc. executives are leaving the slumping Internet company in an exodus that could put CEO Carol Bartz on the hot seat as she approaches the end of her second year trying to engineer a turnaround.
The company disclosed the departures Thursday, confirming an earlier report published on the technology site All Things Digital.
The defecting executives are: Hilary Schneider, an executive vice president who oversaw Yahoo’s advertising in the U.S.; David Ko, a senior vice president in charge of mobile and audience; and Jimmy Pitaro, a vice president who ran the division that produced the heavily trafficked news, sports and finance sections of Yahoo’s website.
“These are some of the most important people at the company,” said Standard and Poor’s equity analyst Scott Kessler. “It’s definitely going to put more pressure on Carol Bartz.”
Bartz, known for her brash, sometimes profane language, has been cutting costs while trying to find ways to get people to spend more time on Yahoo’s website instead of rapidly growing online hangouts such as Facebook and Twitter.
In doing so, Bartz also abandoned any hope of catching Google Inc. in the lucrative Internet search market. She has farmed out the bulk of the company’s search technology to Microsoft Corp.’s Bing.
Although analysts have applauded Bartz for bringing more discipline to Yahoo, her strategy has yielded few dividends. Advertisers are still spending more at Google and Facebook, leaving Yahoo in a financial funk that began under her two predecessors, former movie mogul Terry Semel and company co-founder Jerry Yang.
Yahoo’s stock price also has fallen by about 15 percent so far this year, leaving it even further below the $33 per share that Microsoft was prepared to pay to buy the entire company in May 2008. Yang balked at the offer, prompting Microsoft to withdraw the bid.
Yahoo shares fell 17 cents Thursday to close at $14.17.
Bartz, 62, has cautioned it could take several years to revive Yahoo and pointed out that Apple Inc. didn’t become a Wall Street darling as soon as Steve Jobs returned to the company in 1997.
Yahoo’s board gave Bartz a four-year contract when it hired her in January 2009.
But that the latest personnel losses could prompt some second-guessing about whether the board made the right choice, Kessler said, given that Bartz has been unable to stop an exodus of talent that began under Semel and Yang. “This will increase the wattage of the spotlight on that issue,” he predicted.
Yahoo has persuaded Schneider to remain with the company while it searches for her replacement. The company hopes to fill that key job by the end of the year.
Ko is being succeeded by Raymond Stern, who joined the company last year as senior vice president of North America partnerships. Yahoo didn’t announce who will replace Pitaro.
“We wish them all the best in their future endeavors,” Yahoo said in a statement about the departing executives.
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More