Y
ahoo said on Monday that it would rename itself Altaba Inc. and Chief Executive Officer Marissa Mayer, co-founder David Filo and four other people would be resigning from the company’s board of directors once Verizon Communications Inc. officially takes control. The news comes as part of an 8-K filing with the Security and Exchange (SEC), required as Yahoo is a public company.According to the SEC filing, “The Board also determined that, following the Closing, it intends to cause the Company’s name to be changed to Altaba Inc.”
After the dismal 2016 that Yahoo had, it’s not surprising that the company would want to rebrand itself. At the end of 2016, Yahoo disclosed two separate unauthorized data breaches; one involving some 500 million customer accounts and the second involving over a billion, making it the largest single-company data breaches in history. The company was also reportedly involved in a scandal wherein it built surveillance tools that allow the government scan through customer emails.
Yahoo has a deal to sell its main internet business, which includes its email, digital advertising and media assets, to Verizon for $4.83 billion. It’s entirely possible that Verizon might still walk away from the deal altogether after the hacking disclosures.
“Immediately following the closing [of the takeover]the size of the [Yahoo!] board will be reduced to five directors,” reads the SEC filing.
“Tor Braham, Eric Brandt, Catherine Friedman, Thomas McInerney and Jeffrey Smith will continue to serve as directors of the company following the closing, and Mr Brandt will serve as chairman of the board.
“Each of [Yahoo! co-founder] David Filo, Eddy Hartenstein, Richard Hill, Marissa Mayer, Jane Shaw and Maynard Webb has indicated that he or she intends to resign from the board effective upon the closing, and that his or her intention to resign is not due to any disagreement with the company on any matter relating to the company’s operations, policies or practices.”
Altaba will be a holding company whose primary assets will be a 15 percent stake in Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding and 35.5 percent stake in Yahoo Japan.
Yahoo is the second early web giant that was purchased by Verizon. In 2015, Verizon paid $4.4 billion for AOL.