If you’re looking to leave Verizon after the carrier’s recent suggestion of limiting existing unlimited data plans, Sprint would be happy to have you, and even has an enticing offer to make you switch.
For a limited time, customers can bring their iPhones, regardless of carrier, to any Sprint store and receive $100 off the purchase of an iPhone 4S with the activation of a new line (upgrades are not included in this promotion).
New customers can receive their discount in two ways. You can either reserve the smartphone online and receive an instant $100 discount when you pick it up in the store and bring in your old iPhone, or you can purchase the phone online and then fill out a trade-in form to receive a credit to your account.
More than the discount, though, it may be Sprint’s unlimited data plans that attract new customers. Just this week, a Verizon executive suggested that subscribers who have existing unlimited data plans might not be able to keep them if they decide to upgrade their phone once the carrier’s new shared data plans arrive later this summer. Meanwhile, Sprint gives existing and new customers unlimited access to data on their smartphones.
Sprint’s iPhone 4S promotion begins today for a limited time, but the carrier did not reveal when the offer will end.
Microsoft on Friday won a decision in one of its patent disputes with Motorola Mobility, as the full International Trade Commission ruled that some Motorola devices infringe on its technology.
This patent dispute, one of several between the companies, centers on Microsoft’s ActiveSync technology. Ultimately, the ruling could lead to the ban of imports of Motorola products that infringe on the patent in question.
“Microsoft sued Motorola in the ITC only after Motorola chose to refuse Microsoft’s efforts to renew a patent license for well over a year,” Microsoft deputy general counsel David Howard said in a statement. “We’re pleased the full Commission agreed that Motorola has infringed Microsoft’s intellectual property, and we hope that now Motorola will be willing to join the vast majority of Android device makers selling phones in the U.S. by taking a license to our patents.”
The ITC issued an initial finding of infringement in this case back in December.
Motorola, for its part, notes that it can continue shipping products during a 60-day presidential review process and said it will ponder its options. It also noted that Microsoft had originally sought a ruling that Motorola had infringed on nine patents.
“Although we are disappointed by the Commission’s ruling that certain Motorola Mobility products violated one patent, we look forward to reading the full opinion to understand its reasoning,” Motorola said in a statement. “We will explore all options including appeal.”
Motorola said it will be required to post a 33-cents-per-unit bond for products it ships during the 60-day review period.
This dispute is separate from other conflicts between the two companies, including one related to Microsoft’s Xbox. Motorola has won an initial ruling it its favor from the ITC in that case.
Facebook Inc.’s public debut had plenty of buzz but not much pop. The shares opened 11 percent higher, but struggled to stay above their $38 offering price and ended the day up just 23 cents.
It was a tepid debut for one of the largest and most closely watched initial public offerings. More than 30 brokerages and banks were involved in the offering, which saw a nearly 571 million shares change hands on Friday — a record for a stock debut.
Demand Media CEO Richard Rosenblatt is perennially upbeat, and given the fact that his company just turned in a strong Q1 despite potentially disastrous changes in Google’s all-important search algorithm, he’s got good cause, at least for now.
Here, in keeping with the Ten Things tradition of sharing more than 10 things, are 11 things about Rosenblatt:
What qualities do you like in a person?
I admire people who are curious, innovative, respectful to everyone and eternally optimistic. I firmly believe that the best days are in front of us and we must always try new things while learning from others, in order to continually grow as people.
What qualities do you dislike?
People who are constantly negative rather than being constructive, or those who are jealous of another’s success. Being positive is a state of mind and all about how you perceive a situation — is it a permanent fall or a chance to learn and get back up? I’m also disillusioned by how negatively people react to another’s success when it’s not a zero sum game.
What’s the single most important issue in the world today?
Education. No question. Whether it’s formal or informal. There is unlimited knowledge available via the Internet, and we need to find an effective way to spread this knowledge globally to people who can benefit from it.
Do you still buy CDs or rent DVDs?
No, I download all media on my iPad or stream it through services such as Spotify or Netflix.
What would you be doing if you were not in your current job?
I’d be looking for the next opportunity to innovate in the online media landscape and increase my lecturing opportunities at UCLA and USC.
What is your greatest achievement to date?
Raising three respectful kids who are curious, innovative and optimistic.
iPhone, Android or BlackBerry?
All iPhone all the time.
What site/app do you check first when you wake up?
Twitter to get some news and tweet some info. Then eHow.com, Livestrong.com and Cracked.com to see what’s new and exciting on our properties. And then I’m tweeting again.
What was the last thing you fixed?
Boy, that’s a tough one. I’d say (and my wife would punctuate the point) that “handiness” is not one of my strengths. But, I inflated a flat tire on my son’s bike last weekend, and, as of now, it’s holding air.
If you could have any superpower, what would you choose?
Freeze time, so we would all have more time in the day!
Name your favorite guilty pleasure.
Wine, paddle tennis and pizza (without cheese). The perfect day would be enjoying all three at once!
That newfound cash is burning a hole in Facebook’s pocket.
After raising upward of $15 billion dollars in its first day as a public company, Facebook has acquired social gifting app Karma and all 16 of its employees.
The app is designed to help Facebook users find reasons to give one another gifts, identifying birthdays and special occasions.
It’s an acquisition, not an “acqhire.” So, interestingly enough, the service will stay up and functioning, Karma said on its company blog. As Karma put it, “The service that Karma provides will continue to operate in full force.”
Facebook makes acquisitions all the time, but it’s rare that it keeps the service up and running afterward. Instagram is the only previous example. Some services like FriendFeed are still alive, but only in maintenance mode.
It’s also yet another mobile acquisition, coming directly after the acquisitions of Glancee and Lightbox. As many have pointed out, Facebook has a weak mobile experience; it seems the company is wasting no time in beefing it up.
“We’ve been really impressed with the Karma team and all they accomplished in such a short time,” a Facebook spokesperson told AllThingsD in a statement. “This acquisition combines Karma’s passion and innovative mobile app with Facebook’s platform to help people connect and share in new and meaningful ways.”
Snapped up relatively quickly after being founded in June of last year by the creators of Tapjoy, Karma’s background is well-pedigreed; the app was funded by Kleiner Perkins, Obvious Corporation, Sequoia Capital and Felicis Ventures.
Zynga’s stock was sent into a tailspin today after Facebook’s shares increased only slightly in its first day of trading.
The San Francisco game company, led by Mark Pincus, closed at an all-time low today of $7.12 a share, down 13.91 percent, on twice the amount of normal trading volume.
At least for now, we can expect the two companies to trade in lockstep, given their relationship status.
On one hand, Zynga is Facebook’s largest partner, and on the other, Facebook is where Zynga attracts most of its user base. Last year, Zynga accounted for 12 percent of Facebook’s revenue, consisting of both advertising and virtual goods sold from within social games.
At this point, Zynga couldn’t move fast enough in trying to limit its exposure to just one company, and is currently focused on increasing revenue from other sources, mainly mobile.
After Facebook opened only modestly this morning, Zynga’s stock fell 13 percent, tripping a standard circuit breaker rule that halts trading when a stock trades down more than 10 percent, according to sources familiar with Nasdaq procedures. When Zynga’s trading resumed minutes later, the company’s stock again was halted when shares shot up by 10 percent.
A Zynga spokeswoman declined to comment.
Zynga’s slide today can pretty much be explained by Facebook’s wild ride that started off at $38 a share, then shot up to $42 a share, before falling back down to close essentially flat at $38.23.
RELATED POSTS
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- Hear That?
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- Mobile Highlighted as Key Risk Factor (and Opportunity) in Facebook Filing
- Stop All That Poking: Facebook Filing Temporarily Crashes SEC Web Site
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- Go the F**k Back to Sleep, Silicon Valley: Facebook IPO Likely to File Later Today at Earliest
- Dude, Where’s My Facebook IPO Filing? (Ashton’s on Hold!)
- The Quiet Man: Meet the Less-Known Face of the Facebook IPO, CFO David Ebersman
- Facebook Board Meeting Today for Final IPO Okays
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- Viral Graphic: Visualizing the Facebook IPO
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After the weeks of private equity dealmaker palm rubbing and investor anticipation that preceded it, Facebook’s IPO on Friday was something of an anticlimax. Shares in the newly public company rose to $45 before closing at $38.23. Moments before first-day trading ended, shares were changing hands at $38.00 — their opening price.
Not nearly the blowout that some had been predicting. More of a slowpoke than a superpoke.
“Clearly some of the more ahead-of-themselves valuations didn’t stand up all that well to the IPO stress test,” Max Wolff, an analyst at Greencrest Capital Management, told AllThingsD.
That said, quite a few millionaires were minted today. Some obvious billionaires as well. That very slight uptick gives Facebook a market value of about $104 billion.
“The company was clearly underwhelming in its debut, but nonetheless claimed a rich valuation,” Wolff said. “That’s a testament to the Facebook story, and the number of people who want to own its shares.”
Stern Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia said he was surprised that Facebook didn’t get quite the pop investors seemed to be expecting.
“It was certainly a surprise,” Bhatia told AllThingsD. “At the same time, I’m a bit relieved that investors didn’t get carried away and are behaving rationally. The underwriters priced the stock well.”
So what can we expect on Monday for the stock’s second day on the market?
Said Bhatia, “I expect to be flattish in the near term.”
RELATED POSTS
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- Zynga’s Stock Tanks After Facebook Fails to Pop
- The Price Is Right: Facebook Closes Near Opening Price
- And We’re Off! Facebook Shares Hit the Nasdaq at a Slight Increase Before Settling Back.
- Hear That?
- $$FB$$ Has Arrived: So Now What?
- Facebook Cheers On Mark Zuckerberg. Wall Street Gets Its Chance Soon.
- The Verdict Is In: Facebook Share Price Set at $38
- How Will Facebook’s Zuckerberg Adapt to Working in the Public Eye?
- Facebook IPO Halo Boosts Social Media Stocks
- How Will Facebook Ring in the IPO? With a Hackathon, Of Course.
- What to Expect When Facebook Is Expecting: Five Predictions for Facebook’s First Public Year
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- Investors Told Facebook IPO Will Be in $34 to $38 Price Range
- Facebook Roadshow Bloopers (Comic)
- Facebook’s Latest S-1 Amendment: Yep, We’re Still Weak on Mobile
- $FB Is a Buy, Analysts Say
- Facebook’s Road Show Kicks Off Electronically With Zuckerberg in a T-Shirt (Video)
- After Public Offering, Mark Zuckerberg Will Still Control More Than Half of Facebook
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- During the IPO Quiet Period, Please Enjoy the D Stylings of Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg (Video)
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Earlier this week, GM said it wouldn’t buy any more Facebook ads. Today’s news: It’s not buying any Super Bowl ads, either.
As The Wall Street Journal points out, this isn’t the first time the carmaker has taken a pass on the game — it also bowed out in 2009.
But the news adds some context to the earlier Facebook news. GM is overhauling all of its ad spending plans, so if you’re a Facebook bull you might find the carmaker’s high-profile sub easier to stomach.
T-Mobile has already said that it doesn’t plan to offer shared data plans anytime soon. Now it is throwing cold water on them.
In a blog post on Friday, the No. 4 carrier rejected the idea that pooled data plans will end up being a better value.
“Do families really want to keep track of each others’ data consumption?” T-Mobile said. “We don’t think so. Just imagine mom’s email is suddenly unavailable because her teenage son watched an HD movie on his phone, consuming the family’s data allotment.”
Verizon has said it will offer tiered data plans starting in midsummer, while AT&T has said it is working on a family data plan of its own. Sprint, meanwhile, is keeping its focus on unlimited plans as well.
T-Mobile acknowledges that bandwidth is a limited resource, but says that shared data is not the way to go.
If you get your weather updates from your smartphone, you might want to check out the Weather Channel’s revamped iPhone app.
It’s the first major redesign of the app since 2009, and brings a sleeker design and more personalization and social features.
The changes are apparent as soon as you open the app, where you’re presented with a more visual representation of the current weather. For example, if it’s sunny, the background image shows blue skies; if it’s rainy, the image displays raindrops. You can also customize the background with a favorite photo.
In addition to the visual improvements, the main page now features controls for quicker access to more detailed weather information and the ability to search for other locations. If you have more than one location saved to the app, you can simply swipe left or right on the screen to see the forecast for the other cities.
Finally, a new camera button on the front page allows you take a snapshot of the weather at your location and then share it via Facebook, Twitter, or the Weather Channel.
The updated version of the free, ad-supported Weather Channel app for the iPhone and iPod Touch is available now through the App Store.
Late yesterday afternoon, I was supposed to meet SceneTap CEO Cole Harper at a bar in San Francisco, so I could get an in-person view of his company’s nightlife monitoring system that was set to debut today at various local venues.
More than an hour after we were scheduled to meet, Harper finally emerged from the bar. We were no longer welcome to do a press interview inside, he said.
The manager had been tearing Harper a new one, after getting hostile phone calls all week about the SceneTap launch, which local paper SF Weekly wrote up under the headline “San Francisco Bars to Install Creepy Facial Detection Cameras Inside Venues.”
Of the 25 San Francisco bars supposed to launch with SceneTap today, about 10 dropped out after the outcry, Harper said. That hasn’t happened in any of the other six cities where SceneTap is live.
As we finally sat down at a nearby Starbucks, Harper insisted that his company was misrepresented. SceneTap doesn’t record video about patrons or, as the article said, “keep tabs on them via facial recognition technology.” Rather, it quickly scans new entrants at each venue to determine aggregate numbers of people, their genders and ages.
The point is to help people decide where to go by getting a sense of who is already there.
The SceneTap system includes a sensor on the ceiling at each venue’s entrance as well as a nearby camera-like sensor for facial detection — a fuzzier version of facial recognition — that describes and time-stamps each person. No photo or video recording takes place, Harper said.
Bars can pay Austin-based SceneTap a subscription fee to get analytics about their own patrons. Users — currently just under 100,000 of them — can check SceneTap’s iOS, Android and Web apps to see what’s going on locally or elsewhere.
Harper just posted a long open letter addressed (rather broadly!) to the city of San Francisco, assuring them he is not a bad guy with bad intent:
“I realize there are aspects of our technology that could appear to be controversial and raise serious red flags for people, and I assure you I’m not taking it lightly. … Unfortunately, I think I underestimated the controversial aspects of this technology and what the public’s reaction would be,” he wrote.
Harper elaborated in our interview, “Every single bar that we’re working with already had surveillance systems and cameras recording and other things that were extremely intrusive, in the general opinion,” Harper said. “What we’re adding on is really just a layer that helps from a marketing and social element.”
On the one hand, I see his point; the SceneTap set-up is definitely not as bad as it could be. It’s not posting women’s social media profiles on a map like “Girls Around Me.”
On the other hand, it’s not really that hard to decide what bar to go to! And it’s still offputting to think about the system guessing my age and gender and posting it, even in anonymous aggregated form, on the Internet.
Here’s Harper explaining himself and his company, in a video from our interview:
Hostilities are escalating in Kodak’s patent spat with Apple. Earlier this week, the photography pioneer accused Apple of attempting to undermine the sale of its patent portfolio in a bid to avoid paying the more than $1 billion in patent-infringement damages and royalties Kodak claims it is owed.
At issue here is a patent covering the ability for a digital camera to preview images on an LCD screen. Apple sued Kodak over the technology, claiming that Kodak “misappropriated” it when the two companies were working together years ago. Kodak — which filed for bankruptcy in January and is looking to sell off this patent, along with a host of others, to pay off its creditors — insists that Apple’s ownership claim is “baseless.” And now it’s arguing that Apple’s intent, by alleging misappropriation, is simply to avoid paying royalty payments on it, or to drive the patent’s value down so it can purchase it at a lower price.
“Apple’s decision to press its ownership claims now … should be seen for what it is, namely, a ploy calculated to prevent the debtors from using the [bankruptcy] sale process to obtain a fair price for Kodak’s digital capture portfolio (or to enable Apple to buy it on the cheap and extinguish its infringement exposure),” Kodak said in court documents filed earlier this week, adding that Apple’s ownership claim has already been “squarely rejected” by an International Trade Commission judge.
And, to some extent, it does have a point. Apple didn’t file suit against Kodak until nine years after the patent was first issued, and decades after the two companies worked together on exploring how best to commercialize Apple’s digital camera technologies.
But then, Kodak didn’t sue Apple until 2010, amid the collapse of its finances and a looming Chapter 11 filing. So if Apple’s decision to press ownership claims nine years after the fact is a ploy, then what is Kodak’s decision to assert this patent against Apple a year ealier? A ploy to drive up the patent’s price in advance of a sale?
Just another business negotiation being carried out in the courts …
A Wall Street regulator is examining trading in Groupon Inc. that sent its stock price soaring hours before a favorable earnings announcement Monday, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The review by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or Finra, is at an early stage, the person said. It follows unusually heavy trading in shares of the online-coupon company in the run-up to its release of strong financial results.
Following Facebook’s initial trade on the Nasdaq, Zynga’s stock tanked, hitting an all-time low. The social game maker, which makes up 15 percent of Facebook’s revenue, did not benefit from the company’s public offering. In early trading this morning, Zynga’s shares fell 13.30 percent, or $1.10 apiece, to a new low of $7.17. Zynga went public in December at $10 a share.
Facebook shares began trading on the Nasdaq exchange this morning with an immediate jump of approximately 11 percent to a price of about $42 per share.
It’s a signal that Facebook and its bankers priced its IPO incredibly well; a large leap on the first day would have meant Facebook left money on the table. Instead, the company got the most value out of the shares it sold.
This comes after an initial delay in trading — which usually starts at 11 am ET — of nearly a half an hour, because Nasdaq continued to get last-minute orders, despite the exchange reassuring the public that it was “prepared” for today’s trading mania.
The company officially priced its shares at the high end of its target range last night, settling on $38 per share before the market opened this morning. At that price, Facebook was able to raise upward of $16 billion, a massive capital injection to the company coffers.
At the current stock price, the company is valued at $115.08 billion. That makes Zuckerberg’s stake worth $21.15 billion — for now, at least.
Compare Facebook’s debut to Internet company IPOs of the past year: Yelp traded up more than 65 percent on day one. LinkedIn popped huge on its debut, soaring with a 109 percent bump on its first day.
It’s anyone’s (and everyone’s) guess as to what the stock price will close at this afternoon, though we’ll check back in on it later in the day. Meanwhile, join the thousands of speculative posts on $FB’s closing price at this clever single-serving Web site.
RELATED POSTS
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- Zynga’s Stock Tanks After Facebook Fails to Pop
- The Price Is Right: Facebook Closes Near Opening Price
- And We’re Off! Facebook Shares Hit the Nasdaq at a Slight Increase Before Settling Back.
- Hear That?
- $$FB$$ Has Arrived: So Now What?
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- What to Expect When Facebook Is Expecting: Five Predictions for Facebook’s First Public Year
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Research In Motion this week got regulatory approval for what appears to be a version of its PlayBook tablet with built-in cellular capabilities.
Most of the documents filed with the Federal Communications Commission were kept confidential, but the limited information posted to the agency’s Web site suggests that the tablet contains support for several flavors of wireless connectivity, including Wi-Fi and LTE. The filing also makes reference to Bluetooth and near field communications capabilities.
The move isn’t a shock, given that RIM has promised that an LTE-capable PlayBook would be out later this year.
Whether buyers will be interested in the device is an open question, however.
Which will be the next tech company to go public after Facebook?
That’s an easy one: Kayak.com.
The travel search company, which has been putting off its plans to go public for more than a year and a half, is now getting ready to pull the trigger, according to sources.
The Norwalk, Conn.-based company is by default one of the prime candidates to go public because it has already filed its paperwork and has been dutifully updating its financial statements with the Securities and Exchange Commission every quarter.
A Kayak spokesperson declined to comment, but the timing is good for a number of reasons.
Not only has Facebook priced at the high end of its range, which makes investors a bit more hungry for tech stocks, but other travel companies have been warmly received by the markets over the past few months.
In December, TripAdvisor spun off from Expedia to become an independently held public company. Since then, the company’s stock has soared, trading at $41 a share, up from $27 a share. Expedia is also trading higher, up 50 percent to $41.10 a share.
Kayak could begin its roadshow as soon as Monday and may be seeking as much as $150 million at a $1 billion valuation, according to CNBC. In its original documents, it said it would raise a minimum of $50 million, which served more as a placeholder than what it was intending on raising.
As recently as last week, it updated its filing to report its first quarter earnings, announcing that it earned $4.1 million on $73.3 million. In the year-ago period, it recorded a lost of $6.9 million on revenues of $52.7 million.
Mark Zuckerberg rings the Nasdaq’s opening bell from Facebook’s Palo Alto headquarters. Shares start trading around 11 am ET.
It’s here.
Facebook, the 900-million-strong social network that knows more about us than even our closest friends, will become a publicly traded company within the next hour.
Private equity dealmakers will celebrate alongside cadres of newly minted millionaire engineers in Menlo Park, Calif., while retail investors the world around will clamor amongst themselves, tooth and claw, for the chance to share in a mere fraction of the riches.
And yet, after a year of watching tech IPOs — Zynga, Groupon, LinkedIn, Yelp — let’s all admit that it kind of borders on anticlimactic.
We know we’ll most likely see a nice pop in the share price after Mark Zuckerberg rings in the Nasdaq bell remotely from Facebook’s spanking-new HQ in Silicon Valley.
From there, like a floating jump ball up for grabs, the social networking giant’s closing stock price is anyone’s guess — and by the looks of my Twitter feed, everyone’s guess. There’s already a site dedicated to tracking what price Facebook’s stock will settle at when the markets close, a page peppered with numbers posited by the digital elite.
Today is about the money. And yet it is also more than just sitting and watching the ticker tape roll by. For the first time, Zuckerberg’s vision of making the world a more open place will finally apply to his own company.
We got our first taste of it when the company filed its S-1. It’s where we saw that more than half of Facebook’s 900 million monthly visitors are visiting the site via mobile devices, a channel in which the company has yet to figure out a coherent or viable monetization strategy.
We saw that Zuckerberg retains a tight grip on the company’s future — tighter than most CEOs, akin to the likes of Google’s co-founders — holding voting rights on 57.1 percent of Facebook’s mighty class-B shares. He is so tied to his company that he is cited as a risk factor in Facebook’s S-1, of course.
And now we’re witnessing the first defectors from Facebook’s nacent advertising strategy, as with General Motors pulling its $10 million dollars in advertising on Facebook earlier this week, citing it as an ineffective use of the company’s massive marketing budget.
What we’ll soon see is Facebook’s less-pretty public profile, so to speak, with Zuckerberg holding court over earnings calls every quarter, taking heat from investors who expect returns. We’ll be given insight into how the company plans to monetize its different products, and how they actually fare.
Just as Facebook knows so very much about each of us, we, too, will begin to learn a lot more about Facebook.
And yet, through all of this, no matter what grim forecast Wall Street projects, no matter what executive decisions or company road maps the media decries, Zuckerberg’s message is clear — so much so that he made it the poster for the pre-IPO all-night hackathon:
“Stay focused and keep hacking.”
Good luck with that.
(Images: (top) Morin Uwole/Facebook; (bottom) Victor Luu/Facebook)
Research In Motion’s BlackBerry 7 OS may not be currying much favor among consumers — particularly those biding their time for the launch of BlackBerry 10 later this year — but in the halls of government, it’s a winner.
Last week, the U.S. Department of Defense approved RIM’s BlackBerry 7 devices for agencywide use. And now the device has won similar approvals in the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand.
CESG, the National Technical Authority for Information Assurance in the U.K., on Thursday certified BlackBerry 7 as fit for government and law enforcement use. And the Defense Signals Directorate of the Australian Government did the same for Australia and New Zealand. The reason: Those industry-leading security features RIM is so fond of talking up. Consumers may not pay them much mind, but in government they clearly matter a great deal.
Which is great for RIM’s business, but not quite central to its long-term success. While government sales will certainly help keep RIM afloat, it’s the enterprise and consumer markets where the company really needs some wins. RIM insists that BlackBerry 10 will deliver them, but it won’t launch until later this year.
Yahoo is in the final stages of selling a large chunk of its stake in the Alibaba Group back to the company — in a complex deal that is set to include a multibillion-dollar share buyback to investors of the Silicon Valley Internet giant and an eventual IPO of the Chinese company — according to multiple sources close to the situation.
The deal has yet to be officially approved by the boards of both companies, but sources said it is likely to be, and could be announced as early as Monday.
This all could change, of course, since negotiations between Alibaba and Yahoo have taken place in a variety of ways in recent years, without success and with much acrimony. Talks over a tax-free deal — also involving Yahoo’s Japanese partner, SoftBank — collapsed in February, for example.
But the 324th time is apparently the charm — so here are the details of what looks to be a nearly complete agreement that I have ferreted out thus far from lots of relieved sources familiar with the situation:
Yahoo will sell half of its roughly 40 percent stake in Alibaba, in a taxable deal. The transaction is likely to value that portion of Yahoo’s holdings at about $7 billion — or 20 percent of Alibaba’s $35 billion enterprise valuation. Alibaba is in the midst of raising capital to fund the sale.
After taxes of upward of 35 percent are paid on the long-term gains — remember that Yahoo bought the now-lucrative Alibaba stake for a fraction of that, many years ago — the company will likely use the funds to buy back its own shares. That stock has been caught in the mid-teens doldrums for quite a while.
A shareholder dividend is also being considered. It’s not clear if some of the cash will be held back for acquisitions by Yahoo, sources added, but it is unlikely.
As part of the deal, sources said, incentives have been put in place for Alibaba to move forward with a public offering, which sources stressed is without the contractual obligation or a time frame. Alibaba execs have already been publicly indicating such a direction recently, but this will put them more firmly on that path.
In return, Yahoo has agreed to sell the remaining quarter of its current holdings when that IPO does occur. It would then have an only 10 percent stake of Alibaba, which it could sell at any time after the IPO.
If finally struck, the transaction will finally bring to an end one of the more protracted and disputed relationships in the Internet world.
Once close, the pair have been wrangling over the large Yahoo ownership, which Alibaba CEO Jack Ma has been trying to dislodge in a variety of nice and not-so-nice ways. It has resulted in a number of very public disagreements.
That included a nasty back-and-forth over its Alipay unit with now-fired CEO Carol Bartz, threats of takeover of Yahoo with private equity firms and, more recently, making friendly with its just-ousted CEO, Scott Thompson.
Those talks with him in recent weeks, which included a visit to China by Thompson, led to the new deal, which was negotiated primarily between Yahoo’s CFO Tim Morse and legal head Mike Callahan and Ma and Alibaba’s Joe Tsai.
The talks continued even as Thompson was suddenly engulfed in a controversy over a fake computer science degree on his resume that quickly led to his departure from Yahoo on Sunday.
Ironically, the error was first discovered by activist shareholder Daniel Loeb, who will now vote on the deal as a newly named director of Yahoo, after successfully helping to oust Thompson.
He owns almost 6 percent of Yahoo, and is expected to approve the transaction.
But the final decision to approve the deal will be in the hands of a very new board of Yahoo, which has been drastically reshaped in recent weeks. It is meeting tomorrow and perhaps over the weekend to vote on it.
While the deal with Alibaba looks to be nearing an end, Yahoo’s talks to sell its 33 percent stake in Yahoo Japan is not part of this agreement. That’s due to what Thompson had called a “valuation gap,” which sources said is still an outstanding issue.
New interim CEO Ross Levinsohn has not been involved in the Alibaba deal in any significant way. But he certainly will benefit from its halo effect, if approved, especially given that it will likely boost Yahoo shares.
Next up for Levinsohn, who has just rejiggered Yahoo management again, other sources said, is an effort to settle the patent-infringement lawsuit with Facebook, and also to renegotiate its search deal with Microsoft.
And, oh yes, fix Yahoo’s rocky core-advertising business, which is still in distress and needs a major overhaul to push it back to growth.
But that, as they say, is yet another episode of Yahoo’s ongoing reality show.
Facebook employees give their CEO a standing ovation at the start of the company’s pre-IPO hackathon, which will run through the night and finish up shortly before FB shares begin trading on the Nasdaq.
(Photo via Facebook Product Designer Francis Luu, who has a set of pictures documenting the event.)
Sand Hill venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers has closed its 15th fund today, at $525 million. As had been previously reported, the fund will not be managed by KPCB’s Brook Byers, Bill Joy, Ray Lane and Aileen Lee (who is now doing a seed fund), though those partners will continue to be involved in ongoing investments. What’s new about the fund is a renewed emphasis on digital enterprise companies, in addition to digital consumer, green tech and life sciences.
Here’s a memo that interim Yahoo CEO Ross Levinsohn sent his troops earlier today about some management switcheroos.
No surprise that ousted CEO Scott Thompson’s first big hire from his former job at eBay’s PayPal unit is gone — just-installed-a-minute-ago commerce leader Sam Schrauger. (Also heading out, but not in the memo is PR head Amanda Pires, also from PayPal.)
Also moved aside, to a position unknown, is Thompson’s chief of staff Marta Nichols, who had been head of investor relations at Yahoo. Levinsohn’s new chief of staff is Michel Protti.
So who’s in? Levinsohn favorites, of course, including: Mickie Rosen, who headed Americas media and who now gets global media and commerce; Mollie Spillman, who was co-running commerce with Schrauger and is now head of marketing (replacing former CEO Carol Bartz-regime exec Penny Baldwin).
For those following the soap opera that I am chief writer for, “Days of Our Yahoos,” Levinsohn became leader of the beleaguered Internet giant after a controversy over a false computer science degree on Thompson’s bio.
Like sands through the hourglass, these are the former employees of our Yahoo.
(At least, though, this is not a story about the Facebook IPO — hands up for those sick and tired of that one now?)
Here’s the Levinsohn memo:
Yahoos:
Thank you for all of the feedback, support, and comments since our all-hands meetings in Sunnyvale on Monday and NYC on Wednesday. I’m fired up and I hope you are too. I believe in the power of what we’re doing. We have an incredibly talented team, unparalleled strengths in key areas and most importantly, I see the purple pride building everywhere. Let’s move forward quickly with conviction and confidence.
We have a lot to do. The most pressing thing I heard from you is the desire to clearly define our vision and strategy. I promise you we will be transparent and plan to articulate this in the coming weeks. Right now, we’re identifying the most critical priorities and initiatives, clarifying the scope and charter of teams, ensuring we’re positioned to build on successes quickly and effectively, and focusing on Q2.
As part of this, there are a few changes to the structure of my leadership team beginning today:
**Mickie Rosen is now the head of global media and commerce. Mickie has done a fantastic job driving our Americas media network and will now lead the global media team — including media editorial, business development and partnerships, product, design, and engineering. Additionally, the commerce business unit will return to its original home and report into her. Commerce is a significant opportunity for growth, and in order to thrive it needs to be woven throughout the Yahoo! experience and close to our major traffic drivers.
**Mollie Spilman is our new chief marketing officer (CMO). Mollie is responsible for all of our worldwide marketing and brand efforts as well as the global comms (PR) team. Prior to the commerce org, Mollie ran the Americas marketing team for the last two years, creating closer connections between Yahoo! and its consumers and advertisers.
**Michel Protti will remain as my chief of staff, and will play a vital role in keeping me sane and all of us on track. Marta Nichols will help Michel through a transition as she determines her next role.
**Sam Shrauger is leaving the company and Penny Baldwin will transition her duties to Mollie. I want to thank Penny for leading the Marketing organization as acting CMO. Please join me in wishing them both well in their future endeavors.
As you’ve heard me say before, our largest competitive advantage is that we have amazing people. I want to help unleash our power, and I want to hear your challenges, successes, and how you are going to focus on transforming Yahoo!. Look for frequent and transparent communications from me, and I look forward to hearing from you.
Ross
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