I am sure by now, most of you heard the news that is buzzing all over the Internet. Carol Bartz Joins Yahoo as Chief Executive Officer is the headline of the Yahoo press release. Here is her impressive bio:
Carol Bartz, a veteran technology executive who was most recently Executive Chairman of Autodesk (NASDAQ: ADSK), has been named Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors, effective immediately.Prior to becoming Executive Chairman of Autodesk in 2006, Bartz, 60, led Autodesk as CEO for 14 years, transforming the company into a leader in computer-aided design software. During her tenure as CEO, revenues increased from less than $300 million to more than $1.5 billion, and the company's share price increased nearly ten-fold.
In addition to turning around Autodesk, Bartz's extensive executive experience includes hands-on responsibility for leading global operations, engineering, sales and marketing organizations for large technology and engineering companies including Sun Microsystems, Digital Equipment.
Susan Decker is out after a transitionary period. Greg Sterling has more on the news at Search Engine Land.
Yahoo's stock is up 1.74% in pre-market, but I think people are not sure what to do with the news. I think most like the decision, but they think it will be almost impossible to pull Yahoo out of this mess. Many are still hoping for a Microsoft deal, which was shot down time and time again by Jerry Yang. Jerry Yang will step down from his role as the CEO, which he announced a while back. Yang took the role of CEO in June 2007, and I think it is clear that he didn't do all that well.
Good luck to Bartz and Yahoo, I would hate to see such a nice company fail.
Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums and WebmasterWorld.