Really intere
sting story in The Telegraph – Yahoo plots alliance with Facebook in new search deal. Apparently Yahoo’s new CEO Marissa Mayer has been in talks with Sheryl Sandberg (CEO of Facebook) which might see Facebook ditching Microsoft’s Bing search in favour of Yahoo.
Anyone who has followed my MyTop thesis over the last 5+ years will know that I believe there are rich pickings for the firm that becomes THE portal to the cloud. The place you go to and don’t leave. Google is currently suffering because people like me, rather than searching for, say, ‘Muse new album’ on Google, now do it on Amazon – because that’s where I am going to buy it. If the trend continues, Google’s most lucrative revenue earner will be diminished. Apple is already making major inroads on Google turf too.
Allowing Facebook users to do Yahoo searches without leaving Facebook has a lot of advantages for both parties. So this possible (and it is on a rumour!) Facebook-Yahoo tie up would be significant and would make great sense for both parties.
But why stop there? Yahoo has a market value of $21b – Facebook is $51b. A merger would make sense too.
Note – Richard Holway owns shares in Yahoo.