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Yahoo Sees a Brighter Future with Mayer as CEO

Yahoo reported second quarter results late Tuesday that continued to show the declining fortunes of the Internet giant. Those fortunes could be changing though, as the company now has former Google star employee Marissa Mayer leading Yahoo as CEO. For the quarter, Yahoo reported revenue of $1.2 billion, for a 1 percent year over year […]

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Sean Michael Kerner

Jul 18, 2012

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Yahoo reported second quarter results late Tuesday that continued to show the declining fortunes of the Internet giant. Those fortunes could be changing though, as the company now has former Google star employee Marissa Mayer leading Yahoo as CEO.

For the quarter, Yahoo reported revenue of $1.2 billion, for a 1 percent year over year decline. Income from operations was reported at $55 million, a 71 percent decline from the $191 million reported for the second quarter of 2012. Earnings per Share remained unchanged, however, at $0.18.

“Typically, we’d also provide guidance for the upcoming quarter,” Tim Morse, chief financial officer, said during the company’s earnings call. “In light of the announcement we made yesterday, however, we believe it’s best to give our new CEO time to get acclimated to Yahoo before providing any future guidance.”

Mayer officially joined Yahoo on Tuesday after announcing on Monday that she was leaving Google. Mayer was employee number 20 at Google and helped to lead numerous product initiatives including search, Gmail and Google News.

While Wednesday was her first day as CEO of Yahoo, Morse said that Mayer was not able to join the investor call.

“However, she is very mindful of the importance of the investor community, and I’m sure that you’ll be hearing from her soon,” Morse said. “Suffice to say that everyone at Yahoo is incredibly energized today and looking forward to working with our new CEO.”

Mayer will certainly have her work cut out for her as she tries to return Yahoo to its former glory. One of the items that Yahoo continues to struggle with is revenue from its Microsoft search partnership.

“Unfortunately, similar to last quarter, we’re unable to report progress by Microsoft on closing the gap in marketplace RPS (Revenue Per Search),” Morse said.

Morse added that the Yahoo Microsoft Search Alliance marketplace RPS continues to be below the goal and, therefore, Yahoo is still benefiting from an RPS guarantee from Microsoft.

“Both companies continue to work hard to materially improve the performance, and we plan to provide an update on our joint efforts at our next earnings call,” Morse said.

Yahoo’s search engine has been powered by Microsoft Bing since 2010.

While Yahoo’s deal with Microsoft is not working out as well as expected, Morse painted a far rosier picture on the content side. Yahoo has a news partnership with ABC News that is working out well.

“We’re seeing very promising results from the partnership, particularly in online news video viewership,” Morse said. “In June, Yahoo! News and ABC News accounted for nearly 50 percent of all PC-based online news videos viewed in the United States, according to comScore.”

Yahoo will also benefit from the upcoming London Olympic Games as well as the November U.S. presidential election.

“In Olympics, we expect Yahoo will once again be the most viewed site in the category and take a leading position for online coverage with original video programs, breaking news and expert analysis,” Morse said. “And the upcoming U.S. elections will allow us another opportunity to demonstrate our leadership in online coverage and audience engagement for major events with help from some outstanding new talent and leadership in our Washington bureau.”

Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at InternetNews.com, the news service of the IT Business Edge Network, the network for technology professionals Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist.