Yahoo Search For New CEO Nears CloseAs posted by: Wall Street Journal
Yahoo Inc. is in the final stretch of its search for a chief executive officer, and a decision could come as soon as next week, said people close to the Internet company.
Among candidates still under consideration is Carol Bartz, the former chief executive officer of Autodesk Inc., a publicly traded company that builds design software used in engineering also offering Autodesk Training. She's "on the list," said a person familiar with the matter, adding that she has impressed the Yahoo directors she has met so far.
A Yahoo spokesman declined to comment. An Autodesk spokeswoman said Ms. Bartz was traveling Thursday and couldn't be reached for comment. Her candidacy was first reported by the Web site AllThingsD.com, which is owned by Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal.
Whether Ms. Bartz is a backup candidate or a front-runner remains unclear. People familiar with the matter said the board is leaning toward an external pick at this phase, as it winds down a search it formally announced on Nov. 17. Former Vodafone Group PLC Chief Executive Arun Sarin, whom the Yahoo board had been seriously considering, has withdrawn his name, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr. Sarin didn't return requests for comment.
The board has yet to make an offer and is unlikely to before next week, said people close to the company. At the latest, Yahoo is hoping to announce a new leader before it reports fourth-quarter earnings at the end of the month, they said. Once Yahoo board members agree on a candidate, the company also will have to negotiate an employment agreement. That sometimes takes a few weeks.
Choosing Ms. Bartz, 60 years old, would indicate that Yahoo is looking for a steady hand who has run a public company over someone with Internet and online advertising experience. If the board heads in that direction, the company could also seek to hire another senior executive with more extensive consumer product experience, which analysts and investors argue Yahoo needs to better compete with Google Inc. and other rivals.
Ms. Bartz still serves as executive chairman of Autodesk, of San Rafael, Calif., which she ran as chief executive from 1992 to 2006. Autodesk is around half the size of Yahoo, with approximately 7,000 employees world-wide. In its fiscal year ended January 31, 2008, Autodesk reported $2.2 billion in revenue. Yahoo's revenue in its fiscal year ending December 2007 was $6.97 billion.
Ms. Bartz was also an executive at Sun Microsystems Inc. and she sits on the board of Cisco Systems Inc., with Yahoo's Chief Executive and co-founder Jerry Yang. She is also a member of the Intel Corp. board with Yahoo President Susan Decker.
