Yahoo! Loses Another Key Executive

Bob Parker would be proud, I tell ya.

Yahoo! (YHOO) just lost another “key exec,” claims Tech Crunch. This time, some M&A guy named Kent Goldman. If you are an M&A executive at Yahoo! now, you get more deal flow than… The point is: no one in their right mind is looking at selling to Yahoo! Why? Because no one was rushing to get on the Titanic once it hit that infamous iceberg.

Furthermore, Yahoo! isn’t in the market to buy anyone, because it is too busy with doing a re-org every month… oh, it's also getting in and out of markets on the turn of a dime.

What makes this really ironic is that a lot of people - namely VCs looking to flip otherwise useless and exitless startups - were against Microsoft (MSFT) buying YHOO because it would lead to one less buying party.

This, I thought was nonsense, because when a company that is not strong in an area (MSFT/Web) buys a company that is strong in one area (Web, allegedly) but lacks financial firepower (cash, strong stock) then the buying party uses the selling party as a platform to buy more companies.

In other words, MSFT has the cash but not the slightest clue what to do with some companies… whereas YHOO lacks the cash but has a clue (all right, maybe not anymore) about what to do with web startups.

All things being equal, adding a small web startup to MSFT is not as bright as adding a web startup to YHOO because YHOO is more of a pureplay Web company whereas MSFT is a software firm first and foremost just trying to find its bearings online.

In fact, I could be wrong, but I see CBS (CBS) using CNET to make more acquisitions for largely similar reasons. CBS is a great media company - albeit a traditional one where its audiences are getting too old for marketers to care about - in shrinking business segments. Sure, it bough Wallstrip, Last.fm and a few other such companies… but it cannot get all that aggressive with your typical Web startup. Having however spent $1.8B on CNET, it can now use its balance sheet and cash flow to leverage CNET’s audience and more Web oriented business nature to make more acquisitions.

Indeed, we’ve seen this before: when News Corp. (NWS) bought MySpace and IGN, it did not clam up and put away the checkbook, subsequently buying up Photobucket, Flektor, Strategic Data Corp. and a number of other companies.

The CBS example is fitting, by the way, because Goldman is the second Yahoo! executive to leave the company; Mike Marquez left YHOO to join CBS.  I am pretty sure that he’s seen more M&A activity at CBS in that timespan than Yahoo! has.

But of course, in the near sighted world some people live in, MSFT buying YHOO was a bad thing. Tell that to YHOO stockholders who are today holding a stock that is 50% lower than where it was a month ago, before Yang et al. totally sank the company…