Many in the national media have speculated the likelihood of a potential buyout of Yahoo! by Microsoft. The open letter to Yahoo!, from Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer, states they are willing to purchase Yahoo! for $44.6 Billion.
In a Google dominated Web world, Microsoft attempts to quickly gain market share and hopefully momentum in online marketing with the buyout.
Both Yahoo! and Microsoft have very similar online programs, which would likely mean a lot of overlap within the two companies. Surely there would eventually be a restructuring, which is a nice way of alluding to layoffs at most companies.
Lets not kid ourselves here, lots of the financial success of individuals on the Eastside in one way or another has benefited from Microsoft being a local company. Recently we have seen Yahoo! gain a presence in Downtown Bellevue, which is anticipated to grow. Microsoft in the last year has moved their North America Sales into the Lincoln Square office building in Downtown Bellevue, and additionally has planned to fully occupy all of The Bravern’s office space when complete.
California based Yahoo! would most likely have the majority of the “restructuring” on their end to fit into Microsoft, but still it begs the question if any layoffs or stunting of potential growth on the Eastside would be effected.
