BOO-HOO @ YAHOO!: 700 COULD BE AXED
By PAUL THARP
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January 22, 2008 -- As it fights back rival giants Google and Microsoft from stealing more of its online turf, Yahoo! is tightening its belt by laying off about 700 workers.
Sources yesterday said Yahoo! is undergoing a three-year budget makeover ahead of a slowing economy, and aiming to focus energy on its growing businesses.
It won't come as a surprise if Yahoo jettisons workers, said Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdhry. He believes Yahoo has room to trim its work force by about 5 percent, or 700 employees, after phasing out some of its services, such as auctions and photos.
If several hundred employees are dumped, it will mark Yahoo's most extensive layoffs since 2001 when the company was trying to battle back from the dot-com bust.
Unlike then, Yahoo is profitable now. The efforts, however, haven't help improve Yahoo!'s poor record of seven straight losing quarters - a result that led to the abrupt ouster of CEO Terry Semel last summer.
The exact number of layoffs isn't known, but the company said it would give more details about its cost cutting when fourth-quarter earnings are announced Jan. 29.
Yahoo! expects to finish 2008 with about the same number of workers as it had at the end of 2007 - about 14,000. It also plans to add staff in some areas deemed priorities, insiders said.
"Yahoo! has embarked on a multiyear transformation that includes making tough decisions about the business to help the company grow," a company spokeswoman said in a statement.
CEO Jerry Yang said three months ago Yahoo! would focus on three priorities: becoming the Internet starting point for the most consumers, a "must buy" for the most advertisers and an open technology platform for developers.
Yahoo fell 44 cents to $20.78 last Friday. With Post Wire Services
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