MicroHoo? Revisited

Just came across an interesting article on NY Times entitled "Hostility Has Its Rewards". It talks about hostile takeover attempts in Silicon Valley and how Larry Ellison jump-started the recent flurry with Oracle's take over of PeopleSoft in 2004. A few interesting notes (italicized below):

Everyone said Mr. Ellison was bound to fail. After all, as they love to say here, a technology company’s most valuable assets — its engineers — walk out the door every evening. And with a hostile bidder circling, PeopleSoft’s engineers were bound to run... Only they didn’t.

- So all those that think the corporate culture at Microsoft will not fit with Yahoo! might just be overly pessimistic. The culture is obviously different, but at the same time, many of us work for a salary and if we think the combined entity is a better horse to ride into the future than each alone, then we just might ride it out and see how things progress rather than jump ship... especially with the economy in its current shape.

But in Silicon Valley, unlike elsewhere in the country, even some of the biggest companies like Yahoo are “are still run by founders who are unwilling to sell for emotional reasons,” Mr. Ellison said, perhaps taking a swipe at Jerry Yang, Yahoo’s chief executive and co-founder, who has been frantically searching for an alternative to Microsoft’s bid.

- True enough. Jerry should be looking out for his shareholder's value. And this may mean marrying the Borg, but staying in to keep the best of Yahoo! and even take advantage of Microsoft's strong points. And even prosper in the long term. It's all in the prenup, man. I would not mind seeing Jerry Yang as CEO of MicroHoo! one day. That would be very, very interesting.

Mr. Ellison, whose distaste for Microsoft is legendary, hinted that he’s actually rooting for his longtime nemesis over his neighbor, Yahoo. “I’ve certainly watched Bill for years,” he said, referring to Bill Gates, Microsoft’s chairman and co-founder. “MSN is modestly successful. It would be a formidable portal combined with Yahoo.”

- Agreed! Notice he says "portal" and nothing about search. Like I said, "Search war is over. Google won." They are fighting for the portal that will hold the Consumer Computing Services.

The people who are most likely to scream and moan about an acquisition are the marketing people and salespeople — who, by the way, are the most dispensable, he said.

- Yep, when the Consumer Computing Services are launched by MicroHoo! there will be less need for salespeople and marketing folks. All will be done online!!!