Yahoo Inc is preparing to lay off between 600 and 700 workers in the latest shake-up triggered by the Internet company’s lackluster growth.
Employees were to be notified of the job cuts as early as yesterday, according to a person familiar with Yahoo’s plans. The person asked for anonymity because Yahoo hadn’t made a formal announcement.
The planned cutbacks represent about 5 percent of Yahoo’s work force of 14,100 employees. It will mark Yahoo’s fourth mass layoff in the past three years.
The latest two housecleanings have come under Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz, a Silicon Valley veteran hired nearly two years ago, despite a lack of experience on the Web or in advertising — Yahoo’s main source of revenue.
This week’s round of reductions is expected to be concentrated in Yahoo’s US products group, which already has been undergoing an overhaul since Bartz hired former Microsoft Corp executive Blake Irving to run the division last spring.
The job cuts won’t come as a shock. News of the looming layoffs was first reported last month by two popular technology blogs, TechCrunch and All Things Digital.
Yahoo’s feeble financial growth, stagnant stock price and recent management defections have raised questions about whether Bartz herself might be shown the door before her contract expires in January 2013.
The company’s revenue had edged up by less than 2 percent to US$4.8 billion through the first nine months of the year, reflecting the difficulty Yahoo has had selling ads, while other Internet companies such as Google Inc and Facebook are thriving.
Google’s revenue climbed 23 percent to nearly US$21 billion through the first nine months of the year. Privately held Facebook doesn’t disclose its results, but it is growing so fast that it had to move into larger headquarters earlier this year.
Yahoo’s stock price fell 31 cents to close on Monday at US$16.70, a few cents below where it ended last year. Meanwhile, the -technology-driven NASDAQ composite index has risen by 16 percent so far this year.
The malaise has spurred speculation that opportunistic buyout firms might put together a takeover bid for Yahoo, possibly in partnership with another embattled Internet icon, AOL Inc.
TARIFF TRADE-OFF: Machinery exports to China dropped after Beijing ended its tariff reductions in June, while potential new tariffs fueled ‘front-loaded’ orders to the US The nation’s machinery exports to the US amounted to US$7.19 billion last year, surpassing the US$6.86 billion to China to become the largest export destination for the local machinery industry, the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI, 台灣機械公會) said in a report on Jan. 10. It came as some manufacturers brought forward or “front-loaded” US-bound shipments as required by customers ahead of potential tariffs imposed by the new US administration, the association said. During his campaign, US president-elect Donald Trump threatened tariffs of as high as 60 percent on Chinese goods and 10 percent to 20 percent on imports from other countries.
Taiwanese manufacturers have a chance to play a key role in the humanoid robot supply chain, Tongtai Machine and Tool Co (東台精機) chairman Yen Jui-hsiung (嚴瑞雄) said yesterday. That is because Taiwanese companies are capable of making key parts needed for humanoid robots to move, such as harmonic drives and planetary gearboxes, Yen said. This ability to produce these key elements could help Taiwanese manufacturers “become part of the US supply chain,” he added. Yen made the remarks a day after Nvidia Corp cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) are jointly
United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) expects its addressable market to grow by a low single-digit percentage this year, lower than the overall foundry industry’s 15 percent expansion and the global semiconductor industry’s 10 percent growth, the contract chipmaker said yesterday after reporting the worst profit in four-and-a-half years in the fourth quarter of last year. Growth would be fueled by demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers, a moderate recovery in consumer electronics and an increase in semiconductor content, UMC said. “UMC’s goal is to outgrow our addressable market while maintaining our structural profitability,” UMC copresident Jason Wang (王石) told an online earnings
MARKET SHIFTS: Exports to the US soared more than 120 percent to almost one quarter, while ASEAN has steadily increased to 18.5 percent on rising tech sales The proportion of Taiwan’s exports directed to China, including Hong Kong, declined by more than 12 percentage points last year compared with its peak in 2020, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday last week. The decrease reflects the ongoing restructuring of global supply chains, driven by escalating trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. Data compiled by the ministry showed China and Hong Kong accounted for 31.7 percent of Taiwan’s total outbound sales last year, a drop of 12.2 percentage points from a high of 43.9 percent in 2020. In addition to increasing trade conflicts between China and the US, the ministry said
RSS