Altaba Inc. was a non-diversified, closed-end management

investment company An investment company is a financial institution principally engaged in holding, managing and investing securities. These companies in the United States are regulated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and must be registered under th ...

based in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

that was formed from the remains of the first incarnation of Yahoo! Inc. after

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc. ( ), is an American telecommunications company headquartered in New York City. It is the world's second-largest telecommunications company by revenue and its mobile network is the largest wireless carrier in the ...

had acquired old Yahoo's

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...

business. Verizon completed its acquisition on June 13, 2017, and put the assets under a new subsidiary named Yahoo! Holdings within its newly created division, Oath (now the current incarnation of Yahoo! Inc.). After the transaction, Yahoo! Inc. had no operating business but retained its cash holdings, partnership investments and bond portfolio, as well as certain patents that Verizon did not purchase. It reorganized as an investment fund and changed its name to Altaba Inc. on June 16. The only Yahoo! - branded interest held by Altaba was its stake in the joint venture

Yahoo! Japan is a Japanese web portal. It was the most-visited website in Japan, nearing monopolistic status. According to ''The Japan Times'', as of 2012, Yahoo! Japan had a footprint on the internet market in Japan. In terms of use as a search engine, ...

, which it sold to the

SoftBank Group is a Japanese multinational investment holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, that focuses on investment management. The group primarily invests in companies operating in technology that offer goods and services to customers in a m ...

in late 2018.

History

1994–2017: Yahoo! Inc.

In January 1994, Jerry Yang and David Filo, who were Electrical Engineering graduate students, created a website called "Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web". The Guide was a directory of other websites, organized in a hierarchy, as opposed to a searchable index of pages. In April 1994, Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web was renamed "Yahoo!". The word "YAHOO" is a

backronym A backronym is an acronym formed from an already existing word by expanding its letters into the words of a phrase. Backronyms may be invented with either serious or humorous intent, or they may be a type of false etymology or folk etymology. The ...

for "

Yet Another A naming convention as a form of computer humour especially among playful programmers, yet another is often abbreviated ya, Ya, or YA in the prefix of an acronym or backronym. This humorous prefix is an idiomatic qualifier in the name of a compu ...

Hierarchically Organized Oracle" or "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle." The yahoo.com domain was created on January 18, 1995. Yahoo! grew rapidly throughout the 1990s and diversified into a

web portal A web portal is a specially designed website that brings information from diverse sources, like emails, online forums and search engines, together in a uniform way. Usually, each information source gets its dedicated area on the page for displayin ...

, followed by numerous high-profile acquisitions. The company's stock price skyrocketed during the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (or dot-com boom) was a stock market bubble that ballooned during the late-1990s and peaked on Friday, March 10, 2000. This period of market growth coincided with the widespread adoption of the World Wide Web and the Interne ...

and closed at an all-time high of US$118.75 in 2000; however, after the dot-com bubble burst, it reached an all-time low of US$8.11 in 2001. Yahoo! formally rejected an acquisition bid from the

Microsoft Corporation Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

in 2008. In early 2012, the largest layoff in Yahoo!'s history was completed and 2,000 employees (14 percent of the workforce) lost their jobs. Carol Bartz replaced co-founder Jerry Yang as

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

in January 2009, but was fired by the board of directors in September 2011; Tim Morse was appointed as interim CEO following Bartz's departure. Former

PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support E-commerce payment system, online money transfers; it serves as an electronic alter ...

president Scott Thompson became CEO in January 2012 and after he resigned was replaced by Ross Levinsohn as the company's interim CEO on May 13, 2012. On July 16, former Google executive

Marissa Mayer Marissa Ann Mayer (; born May 30, 1975) is an American business executive and investor who served as President (corporate title), president and chief executive officer of Yahoo! from 2012 to 2017, when it was sold to Verizon. She was a long-tim ...

, became the CEO of the company. The media reported on Yahoo!'s interest in the video streaming site Hulu on May 26, 2013. Under Mayer's leadership, Yahoo!'s bid is worth between US$600 and $800 million, as a variety of options that consist of different circumstances were put forward by the company. As of May 28, 2013, Yahoo!'s videos attract 45 million unique visitors a month, while Hulu has 24 million visitors—the combination of the two audiences can place Yahoo! in the second-most popular position after Google and its subsidiary

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

. Data collated by comScore during July 2013 revealed that more people in the U.S. visited Yahoo! websites during the month in comparison to Google websites—the occasion was the first time that Yahoo! outperformed Google since 2011. The data did not incorporate visit statistics for the Yahoo!-owned Tumblr website or mobile phone usage. On September 22, 2016, Yahoo disclosed a data breach in which hackers stole information associated with at least 500 million user accounts in late 2014. According to the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

, this was the largest technical breach reported to date. Specific details of material taken include names, email addresses, telephone numbers, encrypted or unencrypted security questions and answers, dates of birth, and encrypted

password A password, sometimes called a passcode, is secret data, typically a string of characters, usually used to confirm a user's identity. Traditionally, passwords were expected to be memorized, but the large number of password-protected services t ...

s. The breach used manufactured web cookies to falsify login credentials, allowing hackers to gain access to any account without a password. On December 14, 2016 a separate data breach, occurring earlier around August 2013 was reported. This breach affected over 1 billion user accounts and is again considered the largest discovered in the

history of the Internet The history of the Internet originated in the efforts of scientists and engineers to build and interconnect computer networks. The Internet protocol suite, Internet Protocol Suite, the set of rules used to communicate between networks and devi ...

. On June 13, 2017, following the departure of

, Thomas J. McInerney was appointed chairman and CEO of Yahoo! Inc.

2017–2019: Altaba Inc.

On June 16, 2017, the company that remained after Verizon Communications purchased the core Internet businesses of Yahoo! Inc. was renamed Altaba Inc. The new company, listed by the

Securities and Exchange Commission The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street crash of 1929. Its primary purpose is to enforce laws against market m ...

as a "non-diversified, closed-end management investment company," immediately began trading on

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market (; National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the U.S. by volume, and ranked second on the list ...

under the ticker symbol AABA. In September 2018, Altaba settled three lawsuits relating to Yahoo's data breaches for $47 million. On September 17, 2018, Altaba announced the sale of their stake in Yahoo Japan Corporation for $4.3 billion. On the same day, Altaba announced a $5.75 billion share repurchase program. On April 3, 2019, Altaba announced in a press release that it would sell its stake in

Alibaba Group Alibaba Group Holding Limited, branded as Alibaba (), is a Chinese Multinational corporation, multinational technology company specializing in E-commerce in China, e-commerce, retail, Internet, and technology. Founded on 28 June 1999 in Hangzho ...

and shut down. The company would shut down in the fourth quarter of 2019. On October 2, 2019, Altaba stopped trading on the Nasdaq at the close of the day, and pursuant to its Plan of Complete Liquidation and Dissolution, filed a certificate of dissolution in Delaware ( where Altaba is domiciled), on October 4. A small amount of funds will be withheld for potential Chinese taxes on the sale of its stake in the Alibaba Group. In 2020, the company sold the Excalibur IP patent portfolio to RPX Corporation.

Assets

Excalibur IP, a patent company owned by Altaba, controlled a significant minority interest in

(16.3%) until it sold its stake in 2019, and maintained investments in Hortonworks, Gomaji, Envestnet, Rimage Corporation, SeatGeek, Protagenic Therapeutics,

Eastman Kodak Company The Eastman Kodak Company, referred to simply as Kodak (), is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in film photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorporated i ...

, and Paperless Post. The Fund's external investment advisors included BlackRock Advisors, LLC and Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC. The company divested itself of all holdings in Snap Inc. (the owner of Snapchat) and

References

External links

* * {{authority control Yahoo! Financial services companies established in 1995 Financial services companies disestablished in 2019 Companies formerly listed on the Nasdaq Investment companies based in New York City American companies established in 1995 1995 initial public offerings American companies disestablished in 2019 1995 establishments in New York (state) 2019 disestablishments in New York (state)