{"id":3697,"date":"2008-11-30T01:44:14","date_gmt":"2008-11-30T05:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mathewingram.com\/work\/?p=3697"},"modified":"2008-11-30T01:44:14","modified_gmt":"2008-11-30T05:44:14","slug":"msft-and-yahoo-nom-nom-nom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/2008\/11\/30\/msft-and-yahoo-nom-nom-nom\/","title":{"rendered":"MSFT and Yahoo: Nom nom nom"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kara Swisher at All Things Digital always gives me grief when I do this, but I’m going to do it anyway: Namely, point to a rumour — in this case, a rumour in the Times of London about Microsoft making some kind of<\/a> convoluted deal to proceed with what amounts to a creeping takeover of Yahoo (Update<\/strong>: Kara says that sources tell her<\/a> it is “total fiction”). According to the report, the deal would involve Ross Levinsohn (formerly of Fox Interactive Media) and Jonathan Miller (formerly of Yahoo) raising $5-billion and Microsoft putting in another $5-billion, and the two groups acquiring a 30-per-cent stake in the troubled Web giant, which Levinsohn and Miller would run. Microsoft would manage the search business and would have a call option on buying the whole enchilada for $20-billion.<\/p>\n

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MG Siegler at VentureBeat says he ran this report by Levinsohn, who said he had no idea what the paper was talking about<\/a>. Which would normally put such a rumour to rest pretty quickly, except for a couple of things: The first is that this is a pretty detailed story in the Times of London, a paper not known for running off at the mouth with crazy rumours. If it had appeared in the Daily Mail or the Inquirer or something like that, then I would be dubious. But this particular report has plenty of detail, although there are no sources given (just the usual oblique phrase “it is thought”).<\/p>\n

The second reason for believing something might be up, even if it’s not this specific deal, is the simple fact that Microsoft desperately wants<\/a> Yahoo’s search business, and Yahoo just as desperately wants to dance with the giant software company somehow. Although Steve Ballmer keeps saying he isn’t interested in Yahoo, a lot of that could be designed to push the stock price down and make it easier to acquire the whole company — and even when he tries to put the kibosh on a takeover, he has left the door open for a search deal. The Levinsohn-Miller arrangement seems overly complicated to me, but it’s not hard to believe that something is up.<\/p>\n

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Kara Swisher at All Things Digital always gives me grief when I do this, but I’m going to do it anyway: Namely, point to a rumour — in this case, a rumour in the Times of London about Microsoft making some kind of convoluted deal to proceed with what amounts to a creeping takeover of … <\/p>\n

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