Yahoo ’s board has prefer as the society ’s CEO Scott Thompson , president of eBay ’s PayPal , ending a four - month search after Carol Bartz was force out in other September .
Tim Morse , Yahoo ’s interim CEO , will now go back full - time to his CFO role , the party allege in a statement on Wednesday . Thompson starts on Jan. 9 , at which time he will also take a seat on the party ’s display board .
Under Thompson ’s leaders , PayPal has in recent years become a starring business for eBay , driving much of the caller ’s revenue growth , as the core eBay e - marketplace has stumble a plateau . With Thompson at the helm , PayPal , eBay ’s tocopherol - payment unit , saw its annual revenue spring up from $ 1.8 billion to more than $ 4 billion .
At Yahoo , Thompson will face a challenge that his three predecessors were n’t able-bodied to solve : catch Yahoo to find its applied science leadership in the consumer cyberspace servicing market place and turning around the company ’s financial operation .
“ I fundamentally trust that Yahoo ’s future depends on its ability to create large products and integrated , compelling client experiences . How we do that will be a procedure of birth both excellent engineering science and content , not one or the other , ” Thompson said during a conference call with media and analyst to talk over his appointment .
Thompson may have been echoing one of the unfavorable judgment of his precursor — that while she was center on organisational efficiency and on site content , she did n’t pay as much aid to engineering science . During her tenure , Yahoo was pick apart for failing to cede innovative product , instead often choose to late latch on to live trends establish by others , such as Facebook , Twitter , Apple and Google .
top dog among his finish , Thompson said , is to “ deliver Yahoo ’s next era of [ financial ] growth and riposte the company to a way of diligence - lead innovation . ”
Yahoo ’s Board Chairman Roy Bostock said that Thompson proved at PayPal that he knows how to create “ great ” customer experience , which is cardinal for success in online advertising , Yahoo ’s core business .
Yahoo has in the past times “ trample piddle , ” Bostock tell , adding that what the company require now is “ to build on its very strong asset ” and “ start out swim at a very fast clip . ”
“ Scott knows how to do that ; he has done that , ” Bostock say .
When asked for his plan , Thompson repeatedly said that it ’s too early for him to provide specific details , but that he is positive that Yahoo has the talent , assets and brand to return to being “ at the head of invention , ” developing disruptive engineering , and to jump - start its financial operation .
manufacture analyst Greg Sterling from Sterling Market Intelligence said Thompson ’s appointment suggests a desire by the Yahoo board to reincarnate the caller ’s emphasis on technology and products , “ which was lacking under former CEO Carol Bartz . ”
At PayPal , Thompson led a business that focalise mostly on one matter — processing payments — while at Yahoo he will be in charge of “ a multi - headed fauna ” whose business is much more varied , Sterling say .
“ Thompson has his piece of work cut out for him and will be confronting internal and external challenges on numerous straw man . He ’ll ask to make Yahoo a desirable lieu for people to cultivate again ; he ’ll have to make the Yahoo brand relevant again ; and he ’ll have to find ways to develop ad revenue in an passing free-enterprise market , ” he said via email .
Altimeter Group psychoanalyst Rebecca Lieb also foresees a challenge for Thompson in move from a one - trick pony to a society that in her opinion has had a hard time defining its brand and identity .
“ Yahoo is a brand devilfish . It ’s long been struggling with its identity as a portal , search engine — but no longer — electronic mail supplier , owner of Flickr . There ’s no literal definition of the Yahoo stigma . Homer Armstrong Thompson will be challenge to delineate it , ” she said via email .
Lieb also indicate out that while Thompson may be an expert on e - commerce , it remains to be seen if he can work his thaumaturgy with online publicizing .
“ Yahoo has been founder for a long sentence , both as a brand and a business enterprise . Thompson has a successful rails record in tech , but not in media . Yahoo ’s top speckle is a formidable challenge to any chief executive officer , and the fact the business has been filled does not entirely rule out speculation the party may eventually be sold or at least significantly shed division and product , ” Lieb said .
Bartz took over as chief operating officer in former 2009 from Yahoo Co - Founder Jerry Yang , who in turn had replaced Terry Semel in mid-2007 .
After Bartz ’s discharge , multiple rumors have come forth regarding thecompany ’s time to come , include the hypothesis that the circuit board would betray it whole or in share to reported suer like AOL , Microsoft or Google , or that investor led by Yang could corrupt it and bend it into a in camera held party .
For instance , it was reported in recent week by various media outlets that Yahoo ’s board is actively seeking to divest the companionship of its businesses in Japan and China .
Bostock said that whatever the circuit card ends up deciding , Thompson will be to the full involve in the analysis process , and that he does n’t envision this being a beguilement for the new CEO , because there is a team of citizenry in explosive charge of retrospect Yahoo ’s alternatives in this area .
Thompson joined PayPal in early 2005 and was its CTO , before becoming its chairwoman in January 2008 . Prior to working at PayPal , Thompson was executive frailty president of engineering root at Innovant , a Visa subsidiary company , and CIO at Barclays Global Investors .
His departure is clearly a major loss for eBay . In a statement , eBay said that its CEO John Donahoe will step in as PayPal ’s interim president . DonahoecalledThompson ’s decision “ a stupor ” but say he is confident that it will not negatively impact PayPal ’s future .
A lot of what Thompson said during the conference call echo what his predecessor Bartz say during her first conference call after being describe CEO in January 2009 — that Yahoo has tremendous untapped potential drop , a strong brand , a massive exploiter base , a unanimous advertising customer roster .
Like Thompson , Bartz arrived with a gleaming resume , having serve successfully in executive positions at Digital , Sun and Autodesk , where she was the CEO from 1992 to 2006 .
Bartz manage a significant incorporated realignment intended to make the company more agile . She spearheaded a crowing engineering upgrade to revamp Yahoo ’s publicizing and publishing systems . She also led a streamlining of the caller ’s products and service .
unluckily , 2011 was n’t a good year for her or the party . Yahoo ’s stock and overall fiscal picture fail to improve in any significant path . The company continued to be perceived as a follower of engineering trends , not as an innovator .
Specifically , the search engine partnership that she broker with Microsoft has n’t yielded the expected financial benefits , and the company ’s human relationship with its Formosan spouse Alibaba Group deteriorated further .
What sealedher fatewas credibly the alarming word that Yahoo ’s U.S. show advertising business , historically a nucleus strength , had stumbled in the 2d after part due to a reorganization that generated higher - than - expect employee upset .
