According to reports, the carriers are competing for Yahoo holdings
As Yahoo continues to work with potential buyers of its internet and associated businesses, reports suggest both Verizon Communications and AT&T have made it to a third round of bidding.
CNBC reports: “After holding a board meeting to review second-round offers, Yahoo will start reaching out to bidders as early as Monday to notify them whether they will make it to the next round.” The report goes on to peg the bid-range at $3.5 billion to $5 billion. Aside from Verizon Communications and AT&T, a consortium involving Quicken Loans founder Dan Gilbert and Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett is also in the mix, according to reports.
Earlier this year Verizon Communications’ CEO Lowell McAdam told CNBC’s Jim Cramer he thought “marrying up” Yahoo’s assets with Verizon’s AOL could make sense for investors. McAdam said at the time the price would have to be right.
Last year Verizon paid $4.4 billion for AOL with an eye on boosting its LTE wireless video business, its “over-the-top” video offerings and creating “a growth platform from wireless to [‘internet of things’] for consumers and businesses.”
“We had to really transform ourself,” McAdam said of Verizon Communications in 2015. “We bought AOL. We think that can turn into a real growth engine for us.”
“Why not add Yahoo?” Cramer asked, noting that the company was nearly being “given away. You can’t rule it out. It’s too good a property.”
“We said we would look at it,” McAdam said. “We have to understand the trends that we’re seeing in some of their results now. At the right price, I think marrying up some of [Yahoo’s] assets with AOL … would be a good thing. One of the things we did [with AOL] was keep it separate from the core company. We have been feeding information from our mobile subscribers into the AOL engine. We’ve only had it six months at this point … I don’t want to declare victory; we’ve got a long way to go. Perhaps some things from Yahoo might make sense. I think we can turn [AOL] into something special.”
Yahoo, under pressure from activist shareholders, wants to sell its internet businesses including the search platform, Yahoo News, Yahoo Mail, social media site Tumblr and other holdings.
