Yahoo, Microsoft Combine Search, Advertising Muscles
The 10-year deal combines both companies' strengths and search platforms into a market competitor with a greater scale to fuel development in search and search advertising. The companies are promising more relevant answers for consumers, more value for advertisers, better results for Web publishers, and even increased innovation and efficiency across the Internet.
Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz said the agreement comes with "boatloads of value" for Yahoo, its users, and the search industry. She believes it establishes the foundation for a new era of Internet innovation and development.
"Users will continue to experience search as a vital part of their Yahoo experiences and will enjoy increased innovation, thanks to the scale and resources this deal provides," Bartz said. "Advertisers will also benefit from scale and enjoy greater ease of use and efficiencies working with a single platform and sales team for premium advertisers. Finally, this deal will help us increase our investments in priority areas in winning audience properties, display advertising capabilities, and mobile experiences."
Under the terms of the deal, Microsoft will acquire an exclusive 10-year license to Yahoo's core search technologies, and Microsoft will have the ability to integrate Yahoo search technologies into its existing Web search platforms.
Microsoft's Bing will be the exclusive algorithmic search and paid search platform for Yahoo sites. Yahoo will continue to use its technology and data in other areas of its business, such as enhancing display-advertising technology.
Self-serve advertising for both companies will be fulfilled by Microsoft's AdCenter platform, and prices for all search ads will continue to be set by AdCenter's automated auction process. Each company will maintain its own display advertising business and...
