Julie Jacobson/APYahoo CEO Marissa Mayer
By MICHAEL LIEDTKESAN FRANCISCO -- Yahoo is still prospering from its lucrative investments in Asia while the Internet company's listless advertising sales are picking up under CEO Marissa Mayer, if ever so slightly.
The positive signs in! a first-quarter report overshadowed a 20 percent decline in Yahoo's (YHOO) earnings during the opening three months of the year.
The results released Tuesday highlight the contrasting performances of Yahoo's investment portfolio and the company's main business of running ad-supported online services. Yahoo is making most of its money from its holdings in two Asian Internet companies -- China's Alibaba Group and Yahoo Japan.
The company's 24 percent stake in Alibaba has turned into Yahoo's crown jewel as the Chinese company prepares to go public. Yahoo's report provided a tantalizing peek at how rapidly Alibaba has been growing. The numbers covered last year's fourth quarter because there is a three-month lag before Yahoo books its portion of Alibaba's earnings.
Alibaba's fourth-quarter earnings more than doubled from the previous year to $1.4 billion while its revenue surged 66 percent to $3.06 billion.
The performance reinforced hopes that Alibaba'! s market value could range somewhere between $150 billion and ! $200 billion when it goes public. That would put Yahoo in line for a huge windfall when it sells its Alibaba stake, providing money to expand its reach through acquisitions and buy back more of its stock.
The expected gains from the Alibaba investment is the main reason Yahoo's stock has more than doubled since Yahoo hired Mayer from Google (GOOG) in July 2012 to revive its ad sales.
Yahoo's stock gained $2.29, or nearly 7 percent, to $36.50 in Tuesday's extended trading.
Mayer still hasn't been able to snap Yahoo out of an advertising funk that began six years ago, although some segments showed modest improvements in the first quarter.
In a heartening sign, Yahoo's display ad revenue crept up by 2 percent from the same time last year, after subtracting commissions from ad partners. That was the first uptick in Yahoo's first-quarter display ad revenue in three years.
"We believe we are moving from our core business being in decline to modest or stable growth," Mayer said in a video conference call.
Yahoo earned $312 million, or 29 cents a share, during the first three months of this year. That compared to $390 million, or 35 cents a share, at the same time last year.
If not for special items, Yahoo said it would have earned 38 cents a share. That was a penny above the average estimate among analysts surveyed by FactSet.
Revenue fell 1 percent from last year to $1.13 billion.
After subtracting ad commission, Yahoo's revenue totaled $1.09 billion -- about $20 million higher than analyst projections.
-
If there's a grandmother of the female-tech leadership movement, it's Weili Dai, who in 1995 co-founded semiconductor company Marvell Technology (MRVL).
Dai was the first woman to be a founder of a global semiconductor company. But co-founder isn't the only hat Dai has worn for Marvell. She's also served as chief operating officer and executive vice president, among other positions.
Dai's influence has helped the company become a dominating force in the semiconductor market. Marvell has brought in annual revenue of more than $3 billion over the past three years.
Meanwhile, Dai generates positive press for the company just by being herself. In 2012 she was honored with the Outstanding Leadership Award from nonprofit Upwardly Global. She's a truly inspiring executive, and not just if you're a woman or a techie.
-
Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) was in rough shape when Meg Whitman arrived as CEO in September 2011. Its stock had taken a colossal downturn from $48.64 that February to $22.32 in September.
Whitman faced the seemingly insurmountable task of saving the dying giant. Even after her appointment, HP's stock would sink even further to a low point of $11.94.
Still, with fierce determination and a thick skin, Whitman has brought better times to HP.
After the team working on Microsoft's (MSFT) search engine Bing awarded multiple server orders to HP competitor Dell (DELL) (the most recent for $350 million), Whitman called Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's CEO, and demanded to know why. Ballmer sent back a lengthy memo detailing nine reasons. Whitman analyzed it thoroughly and took action. The next time Bing needed servers, they went with a bigger order ($530 million) at HP.
It will of course take much more work than one order! for Whitman to reshape HP. However, being receptive to criticism and using it to improve is a great quality in a CEO, and HP may already be benefiting from it. Since hitting that low point of $11.94, HP reached a 2013 high of $23.84.
-
Two years ago, IBM (IBM) picked one of its senior vice presidents, Virginia "Ginni" Rometty, to be its new chief executive officer. It was the first time in the company's history that a woman had been appointed CEO.
Since then, the company has seen another first: the first time its stock went above $200.
Rometty earned the CEO position after steering IBM's acquisition of the consulting unit of Pricewaterhouse Coopers in 2002. At $3.9 billion, it was the largest deal in IBM's history, and as Rometty herself said, the "first and only time a professional services firm of that size has been integrated into another large company."
Offering consulting services has diversified IBM's product offerings, which has in turn broadened the company's reach. In a fickle industry that is constantly changing, having a strong competitive advantage is a huge plus.
IBM went on to make more than $100 billion in 2011, the y! ear of Rometty's appointment, and made $104 billion in 2012. If Rometty has her way, the company will maintain this upward momentum for a long time to come.
-
Like Whitman at IBM, Marissa Mayer was appointed chief executive officer at Yahoo! (YHOO) after a string of CEOs had jumped ship from the company. Yahoo! was struggling, and in 2011 its share price had dropped under $12, its lowest point since 2002. Morale was low, and the company looked to Mayer to save it.
Mayer, who was the 20th employee at Google (GOOG), worked quietly during the first few months following her July 2012 appointment, trying to get the clearest sense of Yahoo!'s business and culture. Then, in February 2013, she made major waves by announcing a controversial telework ban. The era of Mayer had officially begun.
The telework ban sparked a national conversation on the value of being able to work remotely, and arguably brought Yahoo! more attention than it had received in years.
Since then, Yahoo! has enacted a string of tech mergers, each one more high-profile than the last. Its largest acqui! sition was the recent buyout of popular photo blogging platform Tumblr, reportedly for $1 billion.
Yahoo!'s share price is the highest it's been in more than four years, and for the first time since 2010, the company saw an increase in its annual revenue. Mayer definitely has a long way to go, but she's had some impressive results thus far.
-
It's pretty much impossible to talk about women in technology and not bring up Sheryl Sandberg.
The Facebook (FB) chief operations officer has brought copious attention to the subject through the release of her book, "Lean In," regarding the empowerment of women in the workplace. But her professional track record is remarkable by itself.
For a long time Facebook's future looked uncertain -- thanks in part to movies like "The Social Network," it was some were tempted to dismiss it as a fad invented by a nerdy college student in order to look cool, as opposed to a business that could be monetized.
Sandberg's mature, business-oriented presence has helped change that. Since her 2008 appointment, Facebook has achieved impressive earnings in the realms of mobile applications and advertising. The company has weathered its share of blunders (most notably, its disastrous IPO in May 2012), but its annual revenue has ! more than doubled since 2010 -- proof that, with Sandberg's guidance, the company is ready for adulthood and in a position to make some serious money.
- More from DailyFinance:
