Yahoo bested Wall Street expectations today, announcing stronger net income for its third quarter, despite an also expected decline in revenue.

The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo reported net income of 13 cents a share, or $186.1 million, on revenues of $1.13 billion for the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2009, which was a decline from $1.33 billion the same period a year ago.

Wall Street estimated that Yahoo (YHOO) would earn just under seven cents a share on revenues of $1.12 billion.

The improvement includes a $98 million gain on a sale of the company’s stake in Alibaba.com in China, which is nonrecurring, as well as other cost-cutting by CEO Carol Bartz.

In addition, Yahoo’s expectations for the fourth quarter are more positive than those of investors.

Also in the earnings numbers: Yahoo had $4.5 billion in cash and marketable securities, as well as 13,200 employees.

But there was something to worry about: Search advertising revenue was off 19 percent and display was off eight percent at “Owned and Operated” sites on Yahoo.

Google (GOOG), in contrast, reported a seven percent rise in its recent third-quarter results last week, and its execs projected a mood of smooth sailing ahead and no more econalypse.

Nonetheless, overall, it was a solid performance from the Silicon Valley icon, especially compared to some of its recent and decidedly rockier earnings reports.

But, while investors can now breathe a little sigh of relief that the bleeding seems to have stopped, they will now likely focus on how much growth the Yahoo can have in the future.

That’s the next story for certain, starting with Yahoo’s analyst meeting next Wednesday, although today’s Yahoo management buzzword was “stablized.”

“With revenue coming in above our guidance and flat sequentially, we had a solid third quarter that signals our major businesses have stabilized,” said Bartz in a press release. “With new products like Yahoo! homepage, our brand revitalization campaign and expansion in the Middle East through Maktoob.com, our execution is improving and we’re focused on what we do best–being the center of people’s online lives.”

Added CFO Tim Morse: “In the third quarter we saw strength in key areas of our business. Our efforts to reposition Yahoo! are still in the early stages, but we’re confident that our investments in the business will enable us to capitalize on growth opportunities as the economy recovers.”

You can read all about it in Yahoo’s press release here, which includes performance tables of third-quarter results, or below without tables.

More to come at the conference call at 2 pm, which BoomTown will blog live!

Here is the Yahoo press release on the quarter:

YAHOO! REPORTS THIRD QUARTER 2009 RESULTS

Company Exceeds Revenue Outlook Maintains Strong Balance Sheet with over $4.5 Billion in Cash and Marketable Debt Securities

SUNNYVALE, Calif., October 20, 2009–Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) today reported revenues of $1,575 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2009, a decrease of 12 percent from the third quarter of 2008 and slightly above the second quarter of 2009. Excluding the impact of currency rate fluctuations and divested business lines, revenues for the third quarter of 2009 would have declined 7 percent compared to the third quarter of 2008.

Net income per diluted share for the third quarter of 2009 was $0.13, compared to $0.04 for the third quarter of 2008. Non-GAAP net income per diluted share for the third quarter of 2009 and 2008 was $0.15.

“With revenue coming in above our guidance and flat sequentially, we had a solid third quarter that signals our major businesses have stabilized,” said Yahoo! chief executive officer Carol Bartz. “With new products like Yahoo! homepage, our brand revitalization campaign and expansion in the Middle East through Maktoob.com, our execution is improving and we’re focused on what we do best–being the center of people’s online lives.”

:In the third quarter we saw strength in key areas of our business,” said Yahoo! chief financial officer Tim Morse. “Our efforts to reposition Yahoo! are still in the early stages, but we’re confident that our investments in the business will enable us to capitalize on growth opportunities as the economy recovers.

Revenues

* Marketing services revenues declined 12 percent and fees revenues declined 11 percent, compared to the third quarter of 2008.

* Marketing services revenues were flat and fees revenues increased 2 percent, compared to the second quarter of 2009.

* Marketing services revenues from Owned and Operated sites were $851 million for the third quarter of 2009, a 15 percent decrease compared to $1,002 million for the same period of 2008. The decrease was primarily driven by a 19 percent decline in search advertising revenue and an 8 percent decline in display advertising revenue.

* Marketing services revenues from Affiliate sites were $526 million for the third quarter of 2009, a 6 percent decrease compared to $561 million for the same period of 2008.

Cash Flow and Cash Balance

* Cash flow from operating activities for the third quarter of 2009 was $355 million, a 2 percent increase compared to $347 million for the same period of 2008.

* Free cash flow for the third quarter of 2009 was $258 million, a 20 percent increase compared to $215 million for the same period of 2008.

* Cash, cash equivalents, and investments in marketable debt securities were $4,503 million at September 30, 2009 compared to $3,522 million at December 31, 2008, an increase of $981 million.

Business Outlook

GAAP revenue for the fourth quarter of 2009 is expected to be in the range of $1,600 million to $1,700 million. Non-GAAP operating income before depreciation, amortization, and stock-based compensation expense for the fourth quarter of 2009 is expected to be in the range of $400 million to $450 million. Income from operations for the fourth quarter of 2009 is expected to be in the range of $135 million to $155 million.

When Apple reports its fourth-quarter earnings today, investors are hoping–actually, expecting–that the iconic computer company will look a lot now as it always has.

In other words, don’t go changing and it will please us.

Wall Street is anticipating, as it has throughout the econalypse, another estimate-beating performance from Apple (AAPL).

While Apple has signaled that it will be making up to $1.23 per share for the quarter, the “whisper” number for the quarter is much higher.

Revenue is also expected to rise strongly to upward of $9 billion.

The reason for all this happy talk? Strong sales of all of Apple’s innovative hardware products, including iPods, iPhones, and computers, as well as the big, fat profit margins that came with upgrades by consumers this past quarter to its new Snow Leopard operating-system software.

And, of course, the stock has been showing all this investor love by–as BoomTown has noted recently–defying gravity.

Apple shares are up just above 120 percent since the beginning of the year.

The company closed at $188.05 on Friday, giving it a market valuation of $168.5 billion.

Whether it will continue going up is a big question for investors, although Apple is entering the holiday season, when it typically does well.

Plus, many are expecting the company to goose excitement for 2010 with the announcement of its secret-but-everyone-knows tablet offering.

That said, Microsoft (MSFT) is also officially launching a new operating system this week–Windows 7–which is expected to give Apple some clear competition.

Say it ain’t so.

Having fully embraced the Internet–sometimes to much disdain from old media colleagues back in the day–since the early 1990s as the way of the future in publishing, and even going to far as to abandon a career in print forever some years ago, BoomTown is bereft at the news yesterday that Gourmet magazine was being shish-kababbed.

Gourmet has been, since I started reading it as a young girl, one of the more perfect magazines–full of glamorous travel locales, stunning photos of food and sumptuous prose, all beautifully edited.

Let’s all agree first to blame owner Condé Nast, the famed magazine unit of privately held Advance Publications, for deciding to shutter the elegant and iconic Gourmet–which has been around since 1941–after the November issue.

While circulation remained steady at Gourmet at just under one million monthly paying subscribers, Condé Nast Chief Executive Officer Chuck Townsend pointed to a fall-off in advertising spending by luxury brands that resulted in a money-losing mess.

But, in a follow-up piece in The Wall Street Journal, titled “Gourmet Magazine’s Demise Gives Readers Empty Feeling,” plunging newsstand sales were also noted, apparently due in part to the impact of the Web.

“Gourmet has had to compete with food-related Web sites, which are often free and contain up-to-the-minute content,” said the Journal article.

In other words, the same thing that is occurring in all arenas–from food to tech to fashion to news–was left unsaid.

As in: The scourge of the Internet, laying waste to all those it comes in contact with.

But I dearly hope that this episode with Gourmet does not become another one of those death-by-digital cautionary tales, a case study that no one can sustain this kind of highbrow, expensive-to-make print media anymore, even the free-spending types at Condé Nast.

I am not sure that’s exactly true, though, since the analog experience Gourmet provided was not the same as what’s on the Web, which is what probably kept its circulation steady over the years.

It was clearly an issue of the econalypse–obviously helped along by the fact that people’s reading habits are shifting to online, thought that’s not the root issue.

That’s why Townsend added that Gourmet might live on in books, on television and, most likely of all, on the Internet.

That Gourmet already has a dullish Web site was not mentioned since it is free and not particularly different from the magazine–a decent repurposing, but a repurposing nonetheless.

Now that there is no magazine to fill that Web void, it will be interesting to see if more could be done online with the iconic foodie brand.

Or not.

(That September cover picture above is a quince, by the way, which most would never really know without–um, er–the help of Gourmet.)

BoomTown happens to be in the Seattle area today, deep in the heart of Microsoft territory, which apparently is now living in a state of “new normal” according to a missive by the software giant’s CEO, Steve Ballmer.

Well, it all looks the same to me, but in an “executive e-mail” post yesterday titled “The New Efficiency,” Ballmer has continued to stress a theme he has been sounding since earlier this year about how the entire business ecosystem has to reset itself.

Of course, the “new efficiency” is also the new buzzword around the upcoming launch of Windows 7 and part of an event Microsoft had in San Francisco yesterday, as well as a Web site.

Now, that’s efficient!

Wrote Ballmer in the long post:

“So what is the nature of this shift? After years of economic expansion fueled by unrealistic rates of consumption and unsustainable levels of private debt, the global economy has reset at a lower baseline level of activity. Today, people borrow less, save more, and spend with much greater caution.

“This is the new normal and it will be with us for some time to come. The issue now is how to respond.”

At the same time, in its proxy filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission in advance of its Nov. 19 annual meeting, Microsoft (MSFT) also revealed that the direct compensation of its top execs had been cut rather significantly in 2009 compared to 2008, even though the figures are still large to most average people.

Previously, Microsoft had announced that it had frozen merit-based raises for these execs.

Noted the proxy:

“Reflecting the company’s performance during the severe economic downturn, our executive officers, taken as a group, received Incentive Plan awards equal to 77% of their target awards and 29% lower than the comparable cash bonus and stock awards for fiscal year 2008.”

This was mostly due to declines in the “fair market value of the stock awards at grant,” which Microsoft tried to compensate for in a small way, mostly via increased cash incentive payments.

Ballmer, for example, took in $1.265 million compared to $1.34 before, while COO Kevin Turner’s take-home went from $8.6 million to $5.4 million.

And CFO Chris Liddell–who has been sounding the economic alarm at Microsoft over the last year as its results have weakened, but in a jauntily charming Kiwi accent–took in $3.5 million, down from a previous $4.8 million.

Said the filing about the exec haircuts, which you can read about in detail here:

“In each case, financial results were less than expected due to the impact of worldwide economic conditions on our business. As a result, the Incentive Plan awards to our named executive officers for fiscal year 2009 were below both the target level for their awards and their actual fiscal year 2008 incentive compensation awards.”

Pretty glum overall, much like the rainy winter-is-coming weather that has arrived here in the Pacific Northwest.

Still, in his post–in which he touts the upcoming Windows 7 and other Microsoft products as helpers to ease the economic pain, natch–Ballmer (pictured here at a recent analysts meeting) noted the silver lining in the dark clouds:

“I’m optimistic because I believe we are entering a period of technology-driven transformation that will see a surge in productivity and a flowering of innovation.”

Until then, apparently, as Ballmer also wrote: “With less, do more.”

Folksy set was on the highest burner possible at Fortune magazine’s Most Powerful Women’s conference this morning, as legendary financial investor Warren Buffett took to the stage.

Buffett, who was interviewed by Fortune’s terrific Carol Loomis onstage in Carlsbad, Calif., held forth to the crowd–made up mostly of women–having instructed Loomis previously to “do anything with me…I like your crowd.”

And, of course, the crowd loved Buffett, who has become a Midwestern Yoda, dispensing snippets of sage advice and clever aphorisms to unabashed fans.

Oh, yes, he also has turned himself into one of the world’s richest men while doing it, presiding for decades over his Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) conglomerate.

In the interview, Loomis quizzed Buffett about a range of topics, mostly centering on the economy and the rescue of Wall Street by the federal government.

“I think they’ve done a terrific job, all things considered,” said Buffett about the performance of regulators.

While he said he did not agree with all of the more costly aspects of the various bailouts, he noted that the dire situation needed drastic action.

“We were right at the brink….This country was becoming not only economically dysfunctional, but inoperative,” said Buffett about the econalypse. “We came so close to a meltdown.”

Today, he is much more sanguine about the economic situation, while also noting it was not all sunshine and daisies.

“There are no green shots, but I don’t see anything getting worse either,” said Buffett.

Joking, he noted that the recovery could be quicker if the housing stock was made smaller by blowing up one million houses and allowing “14-year olds to start cohabiting.”

It was an adorkably funny comment, as was his answer to a question from an audience member about who should play him in a movie of his life: George Clooney, of course, but “Danny DeVito’s out.”

Mostly, what struck BoomTown was Buffett’s firm belief in the strength of the system that we have built in the U.S.

“This system works magnificently,” he said flatly.

Well, Buffett is magnificent for dang sure.

Here’s are video snippets of him at the conference–sorry it is a little tinny–talking about women’s underwear, the resilience of the U.S. and why it will be okay in the end:

[Photo courtesy of Fortune magazine.]

]]> http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090915/warren-buffett-at-fortune-womens-conference-on-the-economy-and-george-clooney/feed/ 2 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090907/sticky-situation-of-the-month-ex-yahoo-communications-head-and-peanut-butter-manifesto-scribe-garlinghouse-to-helm-similar-unit-at-aol/ http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090907/sticky-situation-of-the-month-ex-yahoo-communications-head-and-peanut-butter-manifesto-scribe-garlinghouse-to-helm-similar-unit-at-aol/#comments Tue, 08 Sep 2009 03:45:02 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=18169

In the ongoing game of musical chairs among top managers at Internet companies, former Yahoo exec Brad Garlinghouse–famous for his controversial “Peanut Butter Manifesto,” which correctly chided the Internet giant for becoming so lugubrious several years ago–is taking a job at AOL very similar to the one he left at Yahoo last year.

Garlinghouse, 38, has been named president of Internet and mobile communications at AOL, putting him in charge of the New York-based Time Warner (TWX) online unit’s powerful email and instant-messaging properties, including ICQ and AIM.

He has only been in talks with AOL–which used Spencer Stuart’s Internet-top-exec-finder-in-chief Jim Citrin–for a few weeks, in a deal that came together quickly, he and the company said.

Garlinghouse, a longtime Web entrepreneur and exec, had reportedly been considering a number of start-up and venture-related jobs since he left Yahoo last summer after six years there.

Sources said he was seriously considering becoming the CEO of a mobile firm.

He was most recently at Silver Lake Partners, as an “in-house senior advisor,” the private equity firm that recently bought the Skype Internet telephony firm for $1.9 billion. Garlinghouse also reportedly helped work on that deal.

“It’s really exciting to be to able to rebuild and revitalize an industry giant,” said Garlinghouse in an interview with BoomTown earlier today. “I make no bones that these [properties] are in need of that…but there is also a huge opportunity to do something cool.”

Garlinghouse has to hurry. Despite being among the top communications players online–a group that also includes Yahoo (YHOO) and Microsoft (MSFT) and, more recently, Google (GOOG)–AOL has lost relevance with key audiences, even as social networking properties like Facebook and the microblogging service, Twitter, have innovated in the communications space.

The hiring of Garlinghouse, well known in Silicon Valley circles, is meant to counter that.

He will head up AOL’s operations from its Mountain View, Calif., campus–which is also the former HQ of AOL-acquired Netscape Communications–where, said AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, Garlinghouse will “be CEO of Silicon Valley for us.”

Between all its various properties, AOL has several hundred employees in the Northern California area.

Armstrong said AOL–which was founded 25 years ago on the East Coast and has tried and failed many times to get a true foothold in the West–thinks having an important player at the center of the tech industry is critical as it moves to spin off as an independent company by the end of the year.

“We have a triple play in getting a great executive, who is a master in the communications on the Web and who is well known out there,” said Armstrong. “Brad is our senior AOL manager there.”

Along with running all of AOL’s communications properties, Garlinghouse will inherit some of its community properties, although AOL’s Bebo social networking unit–now considered to be an overpriced acquisition error–now resides in its ventures unit, headed by Jon Brod.

Garlinghouse will also be aiding Brod, said Armstrong, with AOL on the lookout for acquisition opportunities in communications and other arenas.

While Garlinghouse declined to be specific about what would pique his buying interest, he was responsible for such big Yahoo deals as its $350 million purchase of Zimbra in the fall of 2007.

He was also key to bringing both Oddpost, which is at the heart of Yahoo’s email offering, and the popular Flickr photosharing service to Yahoo.

Garlinghouse said he has admired what Twitter and Facebook have done, but that they were not destroying traditional online communications, pioneered by AOL, as some assert.

“It’s a vibrant segment and this just means there are a lot of opportunities to enable integration,” he said. “I think of it as an expansion of online communications and I hope AOL can do more collaboration and partnerships.”

Garlinghouse also has to watch AOL’s basic products like email, which was recently passed by Google’s Gmail as the No. 3 email service in the U.S. Yahoo Mail is the top email, while Microsoft’s Hotmail is second.

How much Garlinghouse can do will depend on the future financial strength of AOL. Its advertising business has been hit hard in the econalpyse, with hopes it will return before its money-generating access business continues its slow decline.

Armstrong is now in the midst of looking over AOL’s cost structure and employee base, which most expect will eventually result in another round of layoffs and cuts.

He has been busy creating a different strategy for the company since he arrived earlier this year, as well as hiring (and firing) top execs to create a new management structure.

Now, that includes Garlinghouse.

So, for a look-see at AOL’s latest talent acquisition, here’s a video interview I did with him, just after Yahoo bought Zimbra:

[ See post to watch video ]

And here’s the full press release from AOL about the hiring of Garlinghouse:

AOL NAMES BRAD GARLINGHOUSE AS PRESIDENT, INTERNET AND MOBILE COMMUNICATIONS

NEW YORK, N.Y.–September 8, 2009–AOL today named Brad Garlinghouse as President of Internet and Mobile Communications, spearheading AOL’s global efforts to expand the reach of its e-mail and instant messaging. Garlinghouse will also take on an expanded leadership position for the company, heading up AOL’s Silicon Valley operations from its Mountain View campus and serving as the West Coast lead for AOL Ventures, the company’s venture capital arm headed globally by Jon Brod. Garlinghouse was most recently at Silver Lake Partners as an in-house Senior Advisor.

Prior to Silver Lake, Garlinghouse spent nearly six years at Yahoo!, where he led that company’s communications and community products. Garlinghouse will report directly to AOL’s Chairman and CEO Tim Armstrong.

” Brad Garlinghouse is an all-star in the Internet industry with an unparalleled background and proven track record, having led Yahoo’s communications products to unprecedented growth,” said Armstrong. “In addition to leading our efforts to grow our communications products, Brad will be bringing his global leadership and business experience as a key member of our company’s executive leadership team. He will also be a major force for AOL in Silicon Valley, working to expand our presence there and in the tech community in general. We’re delighted to have Brad on board and know he’ll do great things for AOL.”

“It’s a tremendous opportunity to join AOL at this pivotal moment in its history,” Garlinghouse said. “Tim has set out a clear strategy and vision for where he is taking this company as it becomes independent again. I’m looking forward to working with him and the rest of the team to realize that vision.”

Armstrong, who joined AOL in April, identified Communications as one of the five key areas of strategic focus for AOL after an extensive 100-day review of the company’s business. Other focus areas include Content, Advertising, Local & Mapping and AOL Ventures.

Garlinghouse spent nearly six years at Yahoo! where he most recently served as SVP of Communications and Communities. Prior to that he served as SVP of Communications, Communities and Front Doors, which included the Yahoo! home page. He came to Yahoo in 2003 as VP, Communication Products. During his time there, Yahoo! Mail went from No. 3 to leading all competitors by a wide margin, and the company’s instant messaging service rose to become the leader in that market as well. Garlinghouse also oversaw the company’s Flickr photo-sharing service and Yahoo! Groups.

Prior to Yahoo!, Garlinghouse was CEO of Dialpad.com Inc., responsible for all aspects of the company’s operations, finance, sales and marketing. He was also General Partner at @Ventures, Category Manager of Media Development for the @Home Network, Inc., and Manager at SBC Communications.

Garlinghouse, 38, received his BA in economics from the University of Kansas and his MBA from Harvard Business School.

]]> http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090907/sticky-situation-of-the-month-ex-yahoo-communications-head-and-peanut-butter-manifesto-scribe-garlinghouse-to-helm-similar-unit-at-aol/feed/ 0 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090904/boomtown-talks-about-the-iphone-apps-economy-on-the-news-hour-plus-future-stuff/ http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090904/boomtown-talks-about-the-iphone-apps-economy-on-the-news-hour-plus-future-stuff/#comments Fri, 04 Sep 2009 08:52:40 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=18100

Last night, the News Hour With Jim Lehrer aired a piece on PBS on “how technology companies are innovating amid the recession by designing popular new smart phone applications.”

BoomTown was asked to reprise my recurring role as a naysayer to tech hyperbole that always comes with the latest trend.

This time it was about how perhaps not all of the 65,000 apps being created by legions of third-party developers for the Apple (AAPL) iPhone–as well as for other smart phone platforms such as Google (GOOG) Android and Palm (PALM) Pre–will result in gold, diamonds and unicorns raining down on innovative entrepreneurs.

Well, except for the iBeer folks!

Oddly enough, I somehow went all Jules Verne at the end and started talking about ubiquitous screens on coffee tables, referencing the movie, “Minority Report” (which I love, despite the ever-annoying Tom Cruise).

So, I am obviously just as bad.

Here’s the video from the News Hour and, if you prefer, here is a link to the transcript:

In addition, here is a lovely clip from “Minority Report,” just because I like to embed stuff and it features that cool interactive mall scene and the USA Today e-newspaper (plus Portuguese subtitles!):

]]> http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090904/boomtown-talks-about-the-iphone-apps-economy-on-the-news-hour-plus-future-stuff/feed/ 0 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090902/google-and-others-fish-for-acquisitions-heres-what-they-might-be-looking-for/ http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090902/google-and-others-fish-for-acquisitions-heres-what-they-might-be-looking-for/#comments Wed, 02 Sep 2009 17:33:13 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=18042

Google CEO Eric Schmidt gave what he just had to know would be a much quoted comment to the Nikkei today, explicitly saying that the company had “begun seriously looking into acquisitions again.”

Music to the beleaguered mergers and acquisitions market, to be sure, especially after a recent uptick from other big companies pulling out their wallets again as the impact of the econalypse subsides.

According to sources, Google (GOOG) is working on at least a half-dozen acquisition deals, most of which are small start-ups in the online advertising and cloud computing arenas.

That would be welcome news for many.

That’s because, as The Wall Street Journal noted in a piece today, “August was shaping up to be the worst month for deal making since 1995, according to data provider Dealogic” (see the chart).

That was, until Disney (DIS) bought Marvel for $4 billion, in a deal announced Monday.

Then yesterday, eBay (EBAY) traded 65 percent of its Skype Internet telephony unit to a group of free-spending private investors, led by Silver Lake Partners, for $1.9 billion.

While eye-popping numbers like that make dealmakers smile, most think it is in the spate of smaller venture-backed companies that more of the action will happen, with big companies like Google, Microsoft (MSFT), Apple (AAPL) and even Yahoo (YHOO) as predators.

Many of these were funded in the Web 2.0 boom and have done well enough, but are figuring out that a link with a larger fish will likely make for a better outcome, along with filling in tech and product gaps at the giants.

Think about Facebook’s $50 million acquisition of social networking site FriendFeed recently and you have the right idea.

According to more than a half-dozen Silicon Valley VCs I have spoken to this week, this is the likeliest kind of exit for a large group of their portfolio companies.

Thus, they are putting on their finest and placing themselves on display in the store window, offering talent and innovation.

“We all realize that a lot of these companies are not going to be independent, so we’re all trying to figure out where they best fit in,” said one VC. “We essentially did business development for a lot of the large companies.”

Thus, here are some companies whose names have been bandied about of late by M&A types who say they are more likely candidates for sale:

Veoh, the Web video portal that MediaMemo wrote about in July, has reportedly been searching for a home for a while now as it struggles in a costly space dominated by giants like YouTube and Hulu.

That goes for many other similar video efforts, such as Joost, Metacafe and Dailymotion, all of which have been trying to gain traction.

There is also likely to be a shakeout in the gaming and “guy” content space, which has also seen a lot of funding in the last several years and less monetary success.

Some possible names here include: Xfire, a gaming instant-messaging company Viacom (VIA) bought a couple years ago for $100 million; Giant Realm, a 20-something guy site funded by Comcast (CMCSA) and others; and UGO, Hearst’s version of a 20-something guy site.

Probably, given the need to focus on monetization, the most active M&A space will be in online advertising.

Sources said Google, for example, has been interested in companies such as Teracent, a dynamic ad-serving and optimization start-up in San Mateo.

There are lots of names in this general arena to pick from, from Tumri to Quantcast to AdMob to the Rubicon Project, not all of which are for sale, but might be for the right price.

Lastly, there is the smart phone and telecom space, where there might be some of the bigger deals.

While Palm (PALM) has been trying mightily to gain traction with its Pre offering, many think that if it does not go as well as hoped, the company will be an acquisition target eventually for giant companies like Nokia (NOK).

While many think Microsoft could also be a buyer of Palm, given the lackluster performance of its Windows Mobile devices, it might be more attuned to a much bigger catch: Research in Motion (RIMM) and its business-oriented BlackBerry empire.

Such a massive acquisition–most of those I bounced that idea off agreed–would be an uphill battle, but it would be perhaps the best fish story ever.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

]]> http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090902/google-and-others-fish-for-acquisitions-heres-what-they-might-be-looking-for/feed/ 0 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090806/ouija-alert-the-econalypse-still-flummoxing-tech-and-media-execs/ http://kara.allthingsd.com/20090806/ouija-alert-the-econalypse-still-flummoxing-tech-and-media-execs/#comments Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:12:56 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=17060

It’s hard to know what to think of the economy’s direction, even if you are trying to glean some knowledge from those whom you imagine might know a thing or two about it.

Indeed, if you listened to a variety of tech and media execs talk about what its status is of late, it’s a wonder we can get out of the woods, since no one knows exactly where we are in them.

According to CIsco (CSCO) CEO John Chambers, for example, in reporting estimate-beating-though-still-lackluster fourth-quarter earnings yesterday, we might be at a “tipping point.”

Said Chambers in a statement: “If we continue to see these positive order trends for the next one to two quarters, we believe there is a good chance we will look back and see that the tipping point occurred in our business in Q4.”

Would that be tipping or teetering?

In reporting dismal-ish fourth-quarter earnings also yesterday, News Corp. (NWS) CEO Rupert Murdoch seemed positive, except not.

“I think the worst may be behind us,” said Murdoch during a conference call with analysts. “But there are no clear signs yet of a fast economic recovery.”

Microsoft (MSFT) CFO Chris Liddell turned that on-one-hand-on-the-other-hand around when speaking at the software giant’s recent Financial Analyst Meeting.

“I can’t say this is good that we’re still down relative to where we were a year ago,” he said. “But, on a relative basis, it was a reasonable year from a shareholder value point of view, given the context of the environment that we had.”

So, essentially, Liddell was saying things were bad, except it was good, given how bad it was.

Well, at least it was not Google (GOOG) CEO Eric Schmidt, who repeatedly discounted the economic downturn as it developed in 2008, with quotes like “What recession?”

While he did reluctantly go negative, after it became clear things were really bad, Schmidt was back to being positive about the economy soon enough.

While at an advertising event in Europe in June, using U.S. jobless claims as a reference, Schmidt noted that the business cycle was at the “beginning of the bottom.”

Which, I guess, means what goes down must come up. Mustn’t it?

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