Yahoo! The history of the fallen giants of the internet

Yahoo! The history of the fallen giants of the internet

What began as an idea for a website directory to organize the chaos of the web became one of the first online market giants. Its story is one of a rapid rise and a painful collapse under its own weight. Though in September 2021, there was a glimmer of hope. Again.

photo: Beraldo Leal/CC/Wikimedia

In 1993, the internet was expanding its global reach and luring more and more users. That’s when two young master`s students and future PhD candidates at Stanford University, David Filo and Jerry Yang, decided to help their fellow students and clean up the online mess.

Yang, whose full name is Chih-Yuan Yang, was born in Taiwan but moved to the U.S., to California, with his family at the age of 10. He didn’t know English, but within three years he mastered it. He was passionate about computers and electronics. After finishing high school, he was admitted to the prestigious Stanford University to study electrical engineering. There, in 1989, he met David Filo.

Filo earned a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering from Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana, and was immediately accepted into the master`s program at Stanford. When the young computer enthusiasts met, it was clear that these two would come up with something.

In 1992, both students went on a six-month course to Japan, and in 1994 they completed their doctoral work. During their PhD studies, they decided to organize web pages as a hobby and a way to help younger students. In March 1994, the first website directory was launched: Jerry and David’s Guide to the World Wide Web. The page, though long-winded in name, quickly gained popularity. Within a month, it attracted nearly 100,000 users.


The two doctoral students decided to simplify the name. They just didn’t know what word to use that would reflect their spirit. One night, while flipping through a dictionary, they stumbled upon the word Yahoo:

A group of uncivilized and rude people from Jonathan Swift’s "Gulliver’s Travels".

Years later, Yang recalled: We were definitely uncivilized. So we thought Yahoo! would fit perfectly with what we were doing - it reflects the "wild west" nature of the internet.

For more serious audiences, a different definition was offered. It was said to be an acronym for Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle.

They added an exclamation mark to Yahoo to express the joy of finding a page. It stuck and became part of the brand as of April 1994. On January 18, 1995, the domain yahoo.com was registered, and on March 2 the Yahoo company was founded, with headquarters in Sunnyvale, in Silicon Valley, California. The young programmers and now PhDs didn’t stop there. A directory wasn’t enough. In August 1995, they introduced the Yahoo Search function and added advertising options. It was a smart move.

Yahoo! grows in strength

The fathers of the success had big plans for their baby but knew they couldn’t manage it alone. Projects, finances, advertising... They decided to expand the team. One of the first "recruits" was Srinija Srinivasan. In 1993, she earned a bachelor’s degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford and participated in the Cyc Project, an artificial intelligence initiative aimed at creating a database of human common-sense knowledge. At Yahoo, her job was to organize content. She quickly became editor-in-chief.

In an interview for MINT on February 16, 2009, she said: I helped people connect with the information they were looking for, dealing with privacy issues and the challenges of free idea exchange.

She worked at the company for 15 years. In 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama appointed her to the President’s Commission on Scholars, a federal program recognizing the achievements of outstanding high school students.

The second person added to the duo was Timothy Koogle, a PhD in mechanical engineering. He earned his bachelor’s degree in the field from the University of Virginia and completed his master’s and doctoral studies at Stanford. He owned two companies specializing in industrial robotics and electronic controllers. He sold both and began working for Motorola in 1983. He met Yang and Filo for the first time in February 1995. By March, he was Yahoo!’s CEO, and in April he took the company public.

At the start of 1995, the Yahoo! team had five people, with an average age under thirty. Koogle was the oldest, and although sharp and slightly conservative, he wasn’t afraid of risky decisions - proven by his move to an emerging internet company.

In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, he said: I like building. It looked great. I had come full circle back to my roots in Silicon Valley and startups. It looked like fun - starting something from scratch, six people, no business plan, the chance to create an entirely new company in a market likely to reshape the world. I’ve always had a much higher tolerance for what most people consider risk.

His first move was to charge advertisers while offering services free to users. It proved a hit. Yahoo! had 3,800 banner ads. Soon after, he introduced:

• email
• chat
• online auctions
• real estate services
• financial, health, and other advice

To use these services, users had to register and agree to share their data with other companies. The model caught on, and by October, Yahoo! hit a billion page views.

Barefoot millionaires

Koogle stepped down in 2001, and the success Yahoo! achieved was largely thanks to him. In just six years, he transformed a small start-up into a publicly traded company with shares worth 237.5 million dollars.

In October 1995, Jeff Mallett, a Canadian entrepreneur and investor, joined the Yahoo! team. He was 31 and full of ideas for the future. He became director number 2 and was already the eleventh employee. Over the next five years, thanks to him, the domain’s revenue reached one billion dollars. He left in 2002, after his candidacy for CEO was rejected.

In less than two years, Yang and Filo turned their website directory project into a profitable and useful database, categorized by topic. And they themselves became known as barefoot millionaires - wealthy but always walking around the office barefoot, hence the nickname.


They started with business and economics, science and education, and then added more detailed topics like ecology, astronomy, and physics. They created pages targeted at specific audiences. In 1996 alone, they launched: Yahooligans! and My Yahoo! The first site went live on April 25 and was designed for kids. It served as a web navigation guide for children. The second launched on July 15 and allowed for more personalized access to information.

Yahoo! became famous not only in the U.S. but around the world. Users demanded local versions of the site. The customer demands, the company delivers, and by 1996, Yahoo! was available in:

• Japan (since April 22)
• Canada (since July)
• United Kingdom (since September 23)
• Germany (since October 10)
• France (October 21)

That same year, the first TV ad aired along with the slogan: Do You Yahoo!? A new logo was also introduced.

From its founding to January 1996, Yahoo!`s logo changed three times. The first was a black text logo (Times New Roman). In March 1995, the first redesign came, but it didn’t last long. By August, a yellow Y in a blue circle was introduced. The third version debuted in January 1996: red Yahoo! with an exclamation mark and a slight shadow. This image lasted until May 2009.

Aggressive marketing and millions of users

Yahoo!’s tiny team of just 11 people quickly achieved amazing success. Though the idea came from Yang and Filo (who designed and programmed it), without the Koogle-Mallett duo, Yahoo! wouldn’t have become what it was entering the new century. Mallett managed day-to-day operations, while Koogle built large-scale partnerships and decided where all revenue would come from. And the revenue was significant. By 1997, Yahoo!’s stock price had risen more than 500 percent from its IPO, placing it fourth in the NASDAQ ranking.

The two men, known as K-M, created a company built for the 21st century. Before the new century arrived, Yahoo! had spread across 14 countries with websites in nine languages. Spanish was the first to be added, on June 9, 1998. By the late 1990s, the core Yahoo! services included:

• Yahoo! Chat, online conversations (January 7, 1997)
• Yahoo! Classifieds, a national ad service (February 7, 1997)
• Yahoo! Mail, email service (October 8, 1997)
• Yahoo! Travel, travel portal (November 10, 1997)
• Yahoo! Sports, sports portal (December 8, 1997)
• Yahoo! Games, online games (March 31, 1998)
• Yahoo! Movies, online films (May 12, 1998)
• Yahoo! Small Business, business portal (August 20, 1998)
• Yahoo! Auctions, online auctions (September 14, 1998)
• Yahoo! Shopping, online shopping (November 17, 1998)
• Yahoo! Address Book, an address book accessible from anywhere in the world (December 15, 1998)
• Yahoo! Entertainment, entertainment portal (March 1, 1999)
• Yahoo! Health, health portal (May 27, 1999)
• Yahoo! Messenger, instant messaging (June 21, 1999)

The year 2000 brought just two new services: Yahoo! Photos and Yahoo! Buzz Index, but the service portfolio by the end of the 1990s was impressive. Yahoo! had conquered all corners of the internet. The site’s popularity attracted many investors, but its revenue also came from aggressive brand marketing.

Timothy Koogle worked to have the company name featured in popular TV shows like Ally McBeal and Caroline in the City, at Oakland Athletics baseball games, and on Comedy Central programs. He even put the logo on shirts, laptop bags, surfboards, shoes, and parachutes. These efforts paid off, bringing huge success and revenue. By November 1997, Yahoo! had 25 million users, and the number kept growing.

To expand operations and defeat rising competition, Koogle decided to acquire smaller companies. The first was Four 11, absorbed on October 8, 1997, a company focused on online communication and directories. Next came WebCal (July 1998), GeoCities (January 28, 1999), and on April 1, 1999, the internet broadcaster broadcast.com, which allowed Yahoo! to expand its audio and video services.

In January 1998, Koogle signed a deal with MCI Communications Corporation to jointly promote special online telephone services. He also partnered with Amazon, CD-Now, and E*Trade. The company flourished and grew. Stock prices soared, and the user base exploded. In 1999, 800 employees supported 22,000 advertisers and 35 million registered users. The company was worth a billion dollars.

First major cuts. Effective

Until the end of the 1990s, Yahoo! was the undisputed king of the internet. But in 2000, Google, active since September 1998, began to rise. Koogle seized the moment and signed a deal that made Google the default search engine for Yahoo!

That same year brought a stock market downturn, and like other online platforms, Yahoo! began facing trouble. The company’s value declined, and investors demanded changes. Analytical research showed the site needed a new CEO with media experience, not just technology. There was no choice. Koogle resigned but remained chairman of the company. His final act on the site was the launch of Yahoo! Groups on January 30, 2001. Three months later, during which Jerry Yang temporarily managed the company, Terry Semel became CEO on April 17.

Semel knew little about computers. He had an email inbox, but his secretary printed out his messages, and he responded to them by hand. Yet Filo and Yang saw future success in him. Before joining Yahoo!, Semel had spent 30 years as an executive in the entertainment industry (Warner Brothers, Buena Vista, a Walt Disney subsidiary) and was considered one of the best. He left WB after its merger with Turner Broadcasting and founded Windsor Media. Friends said, he was a multimillionaire. He wasn’t looking for money - he wanted a challenge.


He met Yang in 1997 at a conference in Sun Valley. That’s when Yahoo!’s founder introduced the old business pro to the internet world and admired his business instincts. Since then, Semel had been Yang’s unofficial advisor. When offered the CEO role, Semel was 58 and approached it with caution. He didn’t accept immediately. He held discussions, assessed the situation, and because he liked challenges...

Not everyone welcomed the new director. He lacked tech knowledge. But he knew how to save a sinking company. Yahoo! had operated like a student family - everyone together, working in cubicles with a blue cow at the entrance. Semel wasn’t looking for friendships or deals and started with layoffs.

• He fired more than 12 percent of employees
• Reduced the number of departments from 44 to 4: Media and Entertainment, Communications, Premium Services, and Search
• Abolished informal idea meetings with no company-wide coordination
• Created a Product Council to approve new ideas so that all department heads were aligned and all initiatives met company standards and policies
• Offered premium services to online clients, which required additional fees
• Signed a deal with telecom company SBC Communications (2001), giving Yahoo! users faster internet access

By making these changes, Semel also changed his own view of the internet. He learned the tech jargon, mastering in six months what would take others three years. He earned employee respect, especially as his decisions led to positive results and Yahoo!`s stock started to rise. Two bold acquisitions laid the foundation for that success in 2001:

• Launch Media, a music media company, in June
• HOTJobs, focused on online communication, commerce, and media, in December

Thanks to Launch Media, Yahoo! gained a large music audience and launched the LAUNCH service on December 17, 2001. HOTJobs opened new ad space for the company.

Acquisitions, partnerships, and ventures

A year later, on December 23, 2002, Yahoo! acquired INKTOMI, a search engine provider, enabling the launch of a faster and more professional search tool on April 7, 2003: New Yahoo! Search. In October that same year, Yahoo! took over another search-related company, OVERTURE.

Although Yahoo! remained a market leader, Google was gaining ground. On January 19, 2004, Yahoo! launched its own market research division, Yahoo! Research Lab. Semel emphasized, We didn’t get into search to do what everyone else is doing. We got into it to change the game. And he succeeded.

By mid-2004, Yahoo! saw improvements across the board:

• revenue doubled to $1.4 billion
• stock price rose above $40 per share
• ranked 4th in Fortune 1000 corporations
• had 133 million registered users
• 150,000 advertisers

… and Semel was hailed as the online mastermind. Yahoo! had caught the wind again. Since April 24, 2002, Semel had support from Daniel Rosensweig, who became Chief Operating Officer. He oversaw Yahoo!’s global operations.

In the following years, Yahoo! continued its recovery:

• Acquisitions: European e-commerce company KELKOO, photo-sharing platform Flickr, ad solutions provider AdInterax
• New services: podcasts in 2005, Yahoo! Video in 2006, mobile version in January 2007
• Ventures: January 13, 2003, Semel announced a joint venture with Chinese internet portal SINA; on August 10, 2005, expanded the partnership with global firm Alibaba.com
• Collaborations: Yahoo! partnered with Microsoft to merge global consumer instant messaging platforms. The project launched on October 12, 2005, and six months later, on May 25, 2006, Yahoo! announced a strategic partnership with eBay Inc

On October 17, 2006, the Semel-Rosensweig duo bought 20% of Right Media Inc, allowing advertisers to bid for Yahoo!’s non-premium ad inventory through an open, transparent marketplace.

On November 20, 2006, Yahoo! partnered with 150 American newspapers to deliver search, display, and classified ads to local communities where consumers live and work. The consortium also planned to collaborate on providing local search, content, and applications through newspaper websites.

Trouble and a lawsuit from Chinese journalists

After a major comeback came a string of failures. Semel tried to salvage both his role and the company`s reputation. In December 2006, he announced further management changes and site direction, built around four key goals:

• customer focus
• leading social media environments
• next-generation advertising platform leadership
• organizational efficiency at scale

Additionally, two customer-focused groups were introduced: the Audience Group and the Publishers and Advertisers Group. Reorganization began on January 1, 2007. Although not all of Yahoo!’s missteps were Semel’s doing, he was held accountable. Criticism included:

• turning Yahoo! into an entertainment business and abandoning search and navigation goals
• ignoring the chance to acquire Google
• delayed acquisition of Overture
• mishandling the Facebook acquisition, resulting in a broken deal
• passing on buying DoubleClick (ad banners and animation)
• delays in launching the Panama project
• refusal to accept Microsoft’s acquisition offer
• no vision for absorbed companies
• complacency, belief in bureaucracy, and loss of drive

These were just some of the black clouds hanging over Semel by late 2006 and early 2007. The final straw was Yahoo!’s alleged cooperation with the Chinese government, including handing over information about Chinese journalists’ online activities. Based on the disclosed emails, journalists Wang Xiaoning and Shi Tao were charged with inciting the overthrow of the state and leaking classified state information. They were tortured and ultimately sentenced to 10 years in prison. In April 2007, both journalists sued Yahoo!

The case reached the World Organization for Human Rights and the U.S. Congress, where the portal was told: Technologically and financially you are giants, but morally you are pygmies (Tom Lantos).


All of this, despite earlier successes, led to the dismissal of Terry Semel as CEO. Jerry Yang took over and publicly apologized to the Chinese journalists and their families. He arranged a settlement and established the Human Rights Fund to provide humanitarian and legal aid to online dissidents.

Inside Yahoo!, things weren’t any better. Though it remained the most visited site, its position in global search rankings was steadily declining. In the offices, the peanut butter manifesto emerged - a spoonful of peanut butter and many sandwiches to spread. Senior director Brad Garlinghouse commented on his own company’s condition: We don’t focus on anything specific. We lack a clear, unified vision of our company. We lack decisiveness.

Yang, who officially became CEO on June 18, 2007, had a tough nut to crack.

Yahoo! falls from the internet throne. Google triumphs

Both Yahoo! founders, Filo and Yang, continued working for their company. Although they handed over control to businessmen and investors, they still kept an eye on their child. While Yang sat on the board and acted as company spokesperson, Filo withdrew to the tech department, overseeing high-revenue projects. He avoided the spotlight, content that his innovations made life easier for internet users and were appreciated. Yet 2007 was a difficult year for both Yang, Filo, and Yahoo!.

Yahoo! lost its top spot in the rankings to Google. Though Filo developed new tools for mobile phones and Yang organized presidential debates and launched the eco-site Yahoo! Green, progress was slow and stock prices plummeted.

In July, Yang appointed Maggie Wilderotter, CEO of Citizens Communications Company, to the board. A month later, on August 27, he launched a new free service, All-New Yahoo! for real-time text messaging to mobile phone numbers from the leading webmail provider in four global markets (USA, Canada, India, Philippines). On October 4, 2007, he signed a deal with eBay and PayPal to protect consumers from fraud through email and phishing. Quarterly, he continued to publish company financial results.

On January 7, 2008, Jerry Yang and David Filo presented their vision for the company’s future and its newest mobile products. They also announced the launch of Yahoo! Mobile Developer Platform, a comprehensive solution for developers to create applications optimized for mobile devices that are easy to build, quick to launch, and compatible across a wide range of devices - making access to internet content and services more mobile-friendly.

Filo introduced several tech solutions like smart mail and said: This is the vision of the future we want to leave you with today: Yahoo! helps you get the most from the internet and the people who matter to you, on any platform. We will continue working to give you an online starting point that is more relevant, satisfying, and fun.

Meanwhile, top-level talks began about possibly selling the company. Stocks were crashing. When new companies were acquired, the only strategy seemed to be cutting staff. Internet forums were abuzz with claims about a lack of direction for Yahoo! as a whole.

Microsoft’s offer. The ship is taking on water but still afloat

On February 1, 2008, Microsoft submitted an offer to Yahoo!’s Board of Directors. After thorough consultation with legal and financial advisors, the board stated on February 11:

After careful review, the Board believes Microsoft’s proposal substantially undervalues Yahoo!, including our global brand, broad international audience, recent significant investments in advertising platforms, growth prospects, free cash flow, and earnings potential, as well as our substantial unconsolidated investments. The Board continues to evaluate all strategic options in a rapidly evolving industry and remains committed to maximizing shareholder value.

The offer was rejected, but thoughts of selling shares lingered. Despite new acquisitions (BlueLithium, Maven Networks Inc), new services (Yahoo! oneConnect), and new faces (Ari Balogh became Chief Technology Officer), the company continued to struggle. A June 13 ad-sales deal with Google didn’t help either.

Over the next decade, Yahoo! fought for its survival. In 2008, Yang carried out a massive purge, laying off nearly 1,600 people. In January 2009, he handed over leadership to Carol Bartz. This was not a good move, as Bartz had no background in internet advertising.

Bartz began her term with more layoffs. 675 employees lost their jobs. She reshuffled personnel in offices, canceled team-building events, and sent some staff on unpaid leave. Though analysts agreed these were necessary steps, they waited for her strategic plans - which never came.

Her decisions were secretive, shared last-minute via email. She restricted information flow, shut down subsidiaries - sometimes profitable ones - like GeoCities. Though Yahoo!`s stock rose 15% in her first four months, overall performance showed losses.

In January 2011, Yahoo! launched its Polish site. As with many initiatives, it lacked strategy and a clear plan for a market already saturated with portals. Two years later, on December 31, 2013, the site was closed.


Bartz had no vision for fixing Yahoo!. Over two years, aside from daily swearing, her few contributions included a new Yahoo! logo (May 2009). The red color was replaced with purple, and the shadow removed. The slogan It’s You! was added. A simplified version also appeared: a white Y in a purple circle with a matching exclamation mark.

Jerry Yang leaves Yahoo!

On September 6, 2011, Carol Bartz was fired. Chairman Roy J. Bostock dismissed her by phone. Tim Morse took over as interim CEO.

Morse had joined Yahoo! in 2009 as CFO, thanks to Bartz. After she left, he temporarily ran the company until January 2012. During that time, he sold part of Yahoo!’s shares in Alibaba, generating $4.3 billion. As a financier, when Scott Thompson was named CEO, Morse gladly returned to his previous role.

January 2012 brought another resignation. Though no one knew the exact reason, Jerry Yang announced his departure from the company he co-founded:

My time at Yahoo! - from founding to now - has included some of the most exciting and rewarding experiences of my life. However, the time has come for me to pursue other interests outside the company. I leave Yahoo! after nearly 17 years, confident in Scott Thompson’s leadership and the team’s ability to lead Yahoo! into a successful future.

He had no idea how wrong he was. Thompson lasted only until the end of April. In that short time, he laid off 2,000 employees, reorganized departments, and in March sued Facebook over 10 patents. Like his predecessor, he managed via email.

Thompson’s actions triggered high-level protests within Yahoo!, leading to the departure of key executives, including Blake Irving, head of product. Ultimately, it turned out that Thompson had lied on his resume. Yahoo!’s ratings fell.

With board approval, Thompson was dismissed on May 13. Ross Levinsohn became interim CEO, and on July 17, Marissa Mayer was appointed as the new permanent CEO.

Analysts and the press expected Levinsohn to stay longer, but he chose to leave immediately. In solidarity, several regional employees also resigned, including Marc Grabowski, VP of media sales from Boston.

Marissa Mayer was a former Google VP. She had led many projects and acquisitions. Despite Yahoo! ranking below Google, she accepted the challenge to restore its former glory within two years. She began with HR policies:

• Introduced an online program called PB&J, a complaint and suggestion box. Any issue with 50 votes required management action.
• Banned remote work. Everyone had to work in the office. Those who disagreed were encouraged to resign - an indirect way to reduce headcount.
• Extended paid maternity leave and increased benefits (she was pregnant).
• Implemented a performance ranking system. Low performers had to leave.

These new policies sparked controversy. While cutting costs on one hand, she spent extravagantly on the other. For example, changing the holiday party venue raised costs from $100,000 to $3 million. This behavior caused conflict with CFO and former CEO Tim Morse.

Frugal Morse clashed with Mayer over multiple issues. She said she needed loyal staff she could count on. In the end, Morse left in September 2012. Ken Goldman took over as Chief Financial Officer.

Yahoo! could have bought Facebook. But Verizon bought Yahoo!

Yahoo! had some strong features like email, but struggled with social platforms. A big mistake was rejecting the purchase of Facebook.

Trying to fill this gap, Marissa Mayer led efforts that resulted in acquiring the blogging and social platform Tumblr on May 20, 2013. While considered a good move, it came too late and Yahoo! gained little from it, especially since the company failed to use Tumblr’s full potential.

Despite that, in July it was announced that Yahoo! was back on top. Research showed it had overtaken Google in rankings. In September 2013, the portal changed its logo again and launched a new version of the My Yahoo! homepage. Easier access to features like email, calendar, or Flickr was promoted with a darker purple name label in a new font.

The euphoria was short-lived as the company’s stock began to drop again. Mayer’s decisions turned out to do more harm than good:

• acquisition of the Rockmelt browser and firing all its employees (August 2, 2013)
• hiring Katie Couric for Yahoo! News (November) and firing COO Henrique Castro
• acquisition of video ad provider BrightRoll (December 12, 2014)
• acquisition of Cooliris, a photo-browsing platform (November 21, 2014)
• more layoffs (February 2, 2016)

On September 22, 2016, the company revealed a data breach from 2014 affecting 500 million accounts. In January 2017, another leak was confirmed. It turned out such issues had been happening since 2013, and the company had stayed silent. Trust in Yahoo! collapsed. Twelve more key executives left.

This and other failures pushed Marissa Mayer out of favor. Although in 2014 she ranked 16th in Fortune’s "40 under 40", by March 2016 the same magazine named her the most disappointing leader in the world.

Criticism and lawsuits followed. The company had to compensate employees who sued over their dismissals. Shareholders also turned against Mayer. Missteps by several CEOs and a steep stock decline accelerated ongoing talks with media conglomerate Verizon Communications Inc.

On July 25, 2016, a deal was announced, and in June 2017 it was finalized. Verizon bought Yahoo!’s core business (for $4.83 billion - down from its $125 billion valuation in 2001), excluding its Chinese and Japanese shares (Alibaba Group and Yahoo Japan), which were renamed Altaba Inc. On June 13, Mayer announced her resignation.

Oath is born. Yahoo’s shine fades

The old Yahoo! fell. A NEW Yahoo! emerged, as people said, operating with AOL and HuffPost under the newly formed company Oath Inc., later renamed Verizon Media. Mayer was replaced by AOL’s CEO Tim Armstrong, who also became Oath’s head.

Armstrong approached Yahoo! without sentiment. His strategy focused on recovery, similar to AOL, but his main goals were email, finance, and sports. In other areas, Yahoo! had clearly lost to Google and Bing. It remained in the top ten search engines, but its glory days were over.


Armstrong created a team for ad platform development. Representing Yahoo! was Atte Lahtirant. The team had three goals:

• Build global brands people love
• Build brand platforms partners love
• Build a global company that values talent

Some tech team members, including David Filo, still employed at Yahoo!, were asked to design and launch an expanded tech council to review all aspects of the company, implement tech-based solutions, and establish global tech standards.

One goal was to develop a strategy for deeper expansion into global markets, led by local heads under the oversight of Rose Tsou, Yahoo`s Asia-Pacific chief.

Armstrong’s vision for a digital ad platform clashed with Verizon’s focus on wireless tech and services. The conflict led to Armstrong stepping down in October 2018. He was replaced as Verizon Media CEO by Guru Gowrappan, an Indian engineer and manager, formerly with Alibaba Group, who had led a division of Oath since 2018.

The new CEO presented a new strategy:

• focus on mobile and video products
• grow revenue from ad platforms
• add online shopping and transactions to brand sales
• discontinue the flagging feature

Gowrappan blocked some management decisions, such as further layoffs. He also took bold steps:

• launched Verizon Media Immersive, a VR/AR/MR platform for 5G-based ads and content
• finalized a long-term deal with the NBA for Yahoo Sports marketing and live VR game broadcasts by RYOT
• responded to the pandemic by introducing Wellness Fridays for employees
• launched a coronavirus hub on Yahoo News
• organized a live stream event We Keep Playing about young athletes’ mental health
• donated $10 million in ad space to mental health organizations
• in September 2019 changed the Yahoo! logo again - white letters on a purple background, with "Y" and "!" tilted 22.5 degrees - to refresh the brand’s identity with a simpler, more flexible look that recalls its quirky 1996 original.

Yahoo!’s pandemic response was just one of many initiatives supporting internet users and U.S. society. From the start, the portal was involved in charity, sponsorship, and contests, such as:

• funding student projects
• sponsoring FIFA World Cup 2002 and 2006 tournaments (deal signed on September 11, 2001)
• sponsoring a yodeling world record attempt in November 2003 (record broken in 2015 for Yahoo!’s 20th anniversary)
• running the "Greenest City in America" contest in May 2007
• sponsoring the 2012 Sundance Film Festival
• sponsoring the 2015 LGBTQ Pride Festival in Dublin

Today Yahoo! offers 23 services in business, sports, entertainment, and email. By 2016, 75 sites and services had been shut down, including the popular Yahoo! 360° social network, Ask Yahoo! Q&A platform, Yahoo! Games, and the Yahoo! Go mobile app.

On December 15, 2020, Yahoo! Groups discussion forums were shut down - an error, experts said. The last service to be discontinued was Yahoo! Answers, closed in May 2021.

On September 1, 2021, websites published this statement:

Apollo Global Management announced it had completed the acquisition of Yahoo, formerly part of Verizon Media. In May, the private equity firm agreed to acquire Verizon’s media group - including Yahoo, AOL, and its ad tech and media platforms - for $5 billion.

The group was renamed Yahoo!, and its previous CEO became advisor. Jim Lanzone was appointed to lead. In an open letter to Yahoo! staff on September 10, 2021, Gowrappan wrote:

We’ve entered a new chapter in our story and I’m incredibly proud of everything we’ve achieved together over the past three years. Today, we are a standalone company with real growth potential beyond what we’ve already accomplished. We have the best team, with the right products, content, and tech to shape Yahoo’s future. I’m confident Jim Lanzone will be a great leader for the new Yahoo… building on our success and guiding us forward.

Will Yahoo! regain its former glory under a new owner and another CEO? Time will tell.

Yahoo! Timeline

• 1994, January - Jerry Yang and David Filo create the first website directory "Jerry and David’s Guide to the World Wide Web" as students
• 1994, April - the site adopts the name Yahoo!
• 1995, January 18 - the domain yahoo!.com is registered
• 1995, March 2 - the company is officially registered
• 1995, April - Yahoo! goes public
• 1995, August - first search engine and first ads appear
• 1996, April 22 - Yahoo! launches in Japan
• 1996, April 25 - launch of the Yahooligans! search engine for kids
• 1996, May - first TV commercial with the slogan "Do You Yahoo!?"
• 1996, July 15 - launch of My Yahoo!, a smarter search engine
• 1996, October - Yahoo! reaches one million page views
• 1997, January 7 - first chat and new logo (red lettering with shadow)
• 1997, October 8 - email service launched and first company acquired (Four 11)
• 1997, November - 25 million users recorded
• 1997, November 17 - online shopping launched
• 1998, March 31 - online games introduced
• 1998, June 9 - first foreign language site (Spanish)
• 1999, June 21 - Yahoo! Messenger launches
• 2000, January 30 - Yahoo! Groups launches (an alternative to Facebook)
• 2000, December 17 - music service "Launch" begins
• 2003, January 13 - agreement signed with Chinese portal SINA
• 2003, April 7 - New Yahoo! search engine launches
• 2004, January 19 - Yahoo! Research Lab market research office opens
• 2005, October 10 - podcast service premieres
• 2007, January 1 - major company reorganization begins
• 2007, January - mobile version of the platform launches
• 2007, April 23 - first presidential debates broadcast online
• 2008, January 7 - Yahoo! Mobile Developer Platform introduced
• 2008, March - more layoffs announced
• 2009, May - new logo and slogan "It’s You" launched
• 2011, January - 2013, December 31 - Yahoo! Poland version active
• 2012, January - Jerry Yang resigns from Yahoo!
• 2012, April - Yahoo! sues Facebook over patents
• 2013, May 20 - Yahoo! acquires Tumblr platform
• 2013, September - new logo again and updated My Yahoo! homepage
• 2016, February 2 - more layoffs
• 2016, July 25 - agreement signed with Verizon Communications Inc. to sell Yahoo!
• 2016, September 22 - data breach from 2013-2014 revealed
• 2017, June - acquisition by Verizon completed
• 2019, September - logo updated once again
• 2021, September 1 - Apollo Global Management becomes Yahoo!’s new owner

sources:

• http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview/id/248619.html
• https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!
• https://www.livemint.com/Companies/SgpYiP1KHKyQ1hdjOaQl8H/At-Yahoo-it-has-been-about-power-of-aggregation.html
• https://hai.stanford.edu/people/srinija-srinivasan
• https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/social-sciences-and-law/business-leaders/tim-koogle
• https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/jeff-mallett-a-dot-com-moguls-sporting-life/article4275686/
• https://www.referenceforbusiness.com/biography/F-L/Koogle-Timothy-1951.html
• https://www.notablebiographies.com/news/Ow-Sh/Semel-Terry.html
• http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6765893.stm
• https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2007/nov/14/news.yahoo
• https://www.businessinsider.com/2008/6/was-yahoo-s-terry-semel-the-worst-internet-ceo-ever-yhoo-?IR=T
• https://web.archive.org/web/20080713214826/http://yhoo.client.shareholder.com/press/timeline.cfm
• https://web.archive.org/web/20130224043047/
• http://www.highbeam.com/topics/carol-bartz-t10713
• https://www.reuters.com/article/stocksAndSharesNews/idUKLNE54400I20090505?edition-redirect=uk
• https://observer.com/2011/09/fuck-carol-bartz-a-brief-history-of-yahoos-ousted-ceo-and-bad-words/
• https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/25/business/yahoo-sale.html
• https://www.businessinsider.com/canned-cfo-tim-morse-happy-to-leave-marissa-mayers-yahoo-2012-9?IR=T
• https://www.telix.pl/rynek/2012/01/wspolzalozyciel-i-byly-ceo-jerry-yang-odchodzi-z-yahoo/
• http://www.hngn.com/articles/160929/20151216/marissa-mayer-firing-yahoo-ceo-staff-save-company-shareholder.htm
• https://web.archive.org/web/20170816105009/http://flatfur.com/news/index.php/2017/06/29/oath/
• https://www.vox.com/2016/2/1/10862040/yahoo-marissa-mayer-fail
• https://www.fastcompany.com/90418939/deleting-yahoo-groups-will-leave-a-permanent-stain-on-yahoos-legacy
• https://www.fastcompany.com/40544277/the-glory-that-was-yahoo
• https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xyrtkK7Dop9c-7Ve_CpJgWdokYbL-CNZxZUUnUVMT1M/edit
• https://variety.com/exec/guru-gowrappan/
• https://www.cnet.com/news/yahoo-officially-has-a-new-owner-again/
• https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/10/tinder-ceo-jim-lanzone-will-be-next-ceo-of-yahoo-following-apollo-acquisition.html