Posted May. 6, 2008
Microsoft Corp. has walked away from its bid for Yahoo! Inc. after failing to agree on a price, a setback to the software maker's efforts to catch Google Inc. in the online advertising market.
The world's largest software maker said it offered to raise its $44.6 billion bid by about $5 billion to $33 a share. Yahoo demanded $37, Microsoft said in a statement.
Microsoft, whose Internet business lost $228 million last quarter, now faces the challenge of finding alternatives to buying Yahoo, a purchase that would have tripled its share of the U.S. Web search markets.
The decision also leaves Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang to prove he can revive sales growth and the stock price by keeping the company he co-founded independent.
"This is management putting its employees and its job security ahead of current Yahoo shareholders' interest," said Laura Martin, an analyst at New York-based Soleil Securities Corp. (Bloomberg News)
