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Industry Trends

A Bad Year To End On A Dismal Note For Yahoo!

By December 17, 2008July 30th, 2023No Comments

That the year has been bad for Yahoo in more ways than one has been quite obvious. However, few could have predicted such a dismal ending.

At the start of the year itself, they had enough problems to have to undertake a major reorganization of the firm.

This was followed by Microsoft’s offer to take over Yahoo, in February, which led to a rebellion by the shareholders, after the board rejected the offer. The rebellion was quelled only after investor Carl Icahn and two of his supporters were given a place on the board of the company.

This was followed by the failure of the Google Yahoo ad deal, which could have helped Yahoo!’s sinking fortunes.

Add to this the present economic crisis, and it looks as though Yahoo!’s troubles are never ending.

Now at the fag end of the year, they have had to announce about 1,500 layoffs, which is about 10% of the total staff strength. These layoffs have been spread out across the country and the world, and even include some employees from their subsidiaries like Flickr and Brickhouse.

They expect to save around $400 million in costs, by this action, and it is possible that further layoffs will be announced next year according to Chief Financial Officer Blake Jorgensen.

In the email he sent to Yahoo employees, Jerry Yang says that they “must take actions to better perform in today’s turbulent global economy…laying off employees is unfortunately unavoidable.”

It is possible that the downsizing will help the company to some extent. However, it is terrible news for the employees who have been affected by it, and with the holiday season fast approaching, the timing probably could not have been worse.