May 4, 2008 8:34 PM PDT

Yahoo's Yang: Time for work, not celebration

Posted by Stephen Shankland

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang

(Credit: Dan Farber/CNET Networks)

Microsoft's attempt to acquire Yahoo is behind the company for now, but Yahoo Chief Executive Jerry Yang took pains Sunday to indicate the company has not entered a complacent phase.

"No one is celebrating about the outcome of these past three months...and no one should," Yang said in a post on the Yahoo's corporate blog. "We live and work in a competitive world, and the Web is only going to get more competitive. Executing on our strategic plan is what matters most."

And apparently taking to heart the words of Friedrich Nietzsche--that which does not kill us makes us stronger--he added, "We've emerged a stronger, more focused company with an even greater sense of purpose."

Yang didn't share specifics about what Yahoo plans to do next, now that its resolve is strengthened but in all likelihood its stock price is weakened.

"We'll continue to execute on our plan--making your Internet experience as personal, relevant, open, and social as possible, serving advertisers so well they insist on working with us, and opening up Yahoo in a way that developers dream of," Yang said. "And, we'll also continue to pursue strategic opportunities that position us for long-term success."

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Internally, the company is working rewire its Web site with a plan called Y!Open to link its multiple properties and make them into a foundation on which programmers can build new applications and services. It's an ambitious plan to give the company something of a Web 2.0 overhaul, and my colleague Dan Farber thinks this plan is the Yahoo exclamation mark Yang was talking about when he told employees Saturday, "Now is the time to demonstrate what that exclamation point stands for."

Externally, the two likeliest strategic options are deals with Google to use its search ads and with Time Warner to acquire AOL are in the works, a source familiar with Yahoo's plans said.

Also in the post, Yang also bridled at some media coverage of the acquisition saga.

"Frankly, there's a lot of nonsense and misinformation in what's being reported," he said, then jumped back to the party line when describing what happened. Stop me if you've heard this one before: "The board took its mission very seriously. We clearly indicated to Microsoft that we were open to a transaction, but only if it were on terms that fully recognized the value of Yahoo and was in the best interests of our stockholders."

Yang touted a long list of products and the company's first-quarter results (yes, the ones that left the share price unmoved) as evidence to support "our board's position that Microsoft's offer undervalued our unique global franchise."