It"s no secret that Yahoo is interested in selling off its core business. A report from Re/Code states that Microsoft has been meeting with private equity firms and that they would be willing to "lend significant financing to their efforts", according to numerous sources.
This isn"t the first time that Microsoft has been interested in Yahoo. Back in 2008, the firm made an effort toward a hostile takeover. Then CEO Steve Ballmer had planned to spend $31 a share, for a total of $45 billion.
These days, the two firms are on much better terms and they"ve enjoyed a now longstanding partnership. In 2009, they inked a deal that would make all Yahoo searches powered by Bing.
While that deal was supposed to last for ten years, there were terms that would allow it to be renegotiated after a time, an option that Yahoo accepted last year. While the firm did renew their partnership, searches would no longer be exclusively powered by Bing, and in October, the firm inked a deal with Google.
According to the report in Re/Code, Microsoft is planning on backing the bid because of its interest in keeping its status as the provider of Yahoo Search.
The firm"s market cap is $32.5 billion; however, this includes its Asian subsidiaries, such as Alibaba. Once those are spun off, the core business is estimated to be worth between $6 billion and $8 billion. Yahoo is allegedly asking for $10 billion.
Source: Re/Code