Verizon’s conditions for Yahoo acquisition: Ditch CEO, change the name

The plan

Yahoo’s supposed to sell to Verizon and then disappear south of the border (figuratively, guys) – but after all that’s happened, will Verizon even give Yahoo the time of day?

Pulling a fast one

It’s no secret that despite shattering the glass ceiling, CEO, Marissa Mayer, is nobody’s favorite person right now.

Shocker, then, that what’s left of Yahoo after the Verizon takeover goes through (assuming it does) wants nothing to do with her or her name brand.

The CEO has enough bad press without even bringing up the hacking, so she’ll more than likely get the ax after the acquisition.

Meanwhile, the holding company side of Yahoo will go on to change its name to Altaba Inc, effectively shedding every association with the failing Yahoo once and for all. Sound like “Alibaba” to you? That’s because they own a 15 percent stake of Yahoo and operate Yahoo’s Japanese business, so it is suspected to be a play on an extremely popular brand name overseas.

That’s all well and good, but what if Verizon decides not to bite?

Friendly reminder

Verizon losing interest in the once-appealing Yahoo isn’t such a far-fetched notion. For those of you who have forgotten the contents of the company’s rap sheet, here’s a refresher course:

• Yahoo was hacked once in 2013, to the effect of an estimated one billion compromised accounts.
• Yahoo did not inform users of the above attack until a month ago (over three years later).
• This happened AFTER they were forced to disclose information about a comparatively small attack in 2014 (a paltry 500 million user accounts affected—nothing to write home about, as Yahoo clearly thought) around three months ago.

So, while one can hardly blame Verizon for keeping Yahoo at arm’s length while they wait for a more conclusive evaluation of the security breaches, the subsequent political no-man’s-land is a logistical nightmare for the folks at Yahoo who just want to cut their losses move on. To think that Verizon might just ice the whole deal (or at the very least demand a hefty discount) isn’t far from the realm of feasibility.

They can’t even die correctly

[clickToTweet tweet=”Yahoo’s basically hoping to pull off the corporate equivalent of plastic surgery and a new passport.” quote=”Yahoo’s basically hoping to pull off the corporate equivalent of plastic surgery and a new passport.”]

Until such a time as Verizon absconds with Yahoo’s proverbial dirty laundry, however, the second-rate email service is condemned to wear the same tacky purple robes of defeat that have plagued its shoulders since day one.

Yahoo, it seems, just won’t die like it’s supposed to.

#Altaba