Verizon Communications Inc will announce an agreement on Monday to buy Yahoo Inc for about $5 billion, according to a person familiar with the matter, reports Reuters.
The announcement will come before the start of New York trading hours, the source added. The deal will end months of uncertainty about Yahoo’s future after the company announced plans to review strategic alternatives in February.
Yahoo was not immediately available, and Verizon declined to comment. Bloomberg first reported that the deal will be announced Monday for $4.8 billion. Reuters reported on Friday that Verizon had emerged as the front-runner in the Yahoo auction.
Yahoo’s CEO Marissa Mayer
According to Business Insider, The acquisition by Verizon, the largest telecommunications company in the US, also marks the final chapter to the tumultuous story of one of the internet industry’s pioneering companies. Yahoo was founded in 1994 as one of the first directories to help people navigate the emerging selection of websites.
But Yahoo’s fortunes began to fade during the past decade, as younger rivals such as Google and Facebook attracted more consumers and advertisers. Marissa Mayer, one of Google’s first engineers, joined Yahoo as CEO in 2012 in hopes of reviving its fortunes. But the effort has failed to deliver the hoped-for payoff and a growing group of investors, led by activist firm Starboard, pressured the company to sell itself.
With the Verizon acquisition, Yahoo will be led by another former Googler: Tim Armstrong. Armstrong was the CEO of AOL, which Verizon acquired in 2015, and he is expected to lead a newly combined internet group at Verizon consisting of Yahoo and AOL that brings together online-ad technology and other valuable assets.
