Icahn builds Yahoo! stake

Carl Icahn has quietly built up a four per cent stake in Yahoo! since Microsoft withdrew its offer for the company. Icahn has a history of launching proxy bids for companies he considers have lost their way. In April he won two seats on Motorola's board. His main demand, that Motorola sell off its handset business, was …

[amanfromMars]

Virtual Reality for Dummies ..... Chapter and Verse One.

They could all kiss and make up and unite for a ReConstructive Surgery Bun Fight with Google with a Proxy bid from Yahoo! Icahn for a Hunky Chunk of Microsoft, which would effectively Create a Strategic Competitive Partnership. And when the Proxy Yahoo! Icahn is the Money Markets, which are Stagnating and Lost in a See of their own Sad and Bad and Mad Sub-Prime Performances, Cynically and Perversely hidden and transferred as Credit to Create Virtually, Third Party and Third World Debt and a Debilitating Sense of Indebtedness, for Chaotic Global Control requiring the Exercise of Destructive Military Power rather than Constructive Civilian Controls, would they be able to Create a whole New Vista and with Beta IT Controls in AI ...... A NeuReality Virtually.

And if the Truth be Told, what would they be Following in such a Scenario, other than a Viable Dream which thinks to Take Care of them and that can be supplied by anyone who would care to Take Care of them and of whom they would Take Care, for IT doesn't cost anything other than that which you cannot bear to lose?

HMmmm...... now that does make Sense, so please Ponder IT long and hard before Jumping into the dDeep End of the Gene Genie Pool for ITs DNAVisions. And Beware and be Aware of any Allusion to Delusion and Illusion for such is also the Fertile Soil in which Virtualisation Grows and Prospers...... Sublimely and Stealthily in Plain Sight , Apparent in ITs Transparent Steganography ..... and therefore would any invalid and deprecating critique be Self-defeating.

[Anonymous Coward]

Icahn - Destroyer of Companies?

See title.

It appears so. I'm not sure exactly happened to how business used to work, but now there is no incentive to invest in R&D - no incentive to hold on to key people. It's all about greed and making the quick buck, and damned be the people who get unemployed by it, because it is all about "shareholder value" now. I wonder how many companies will be healthy in 10 years because of those two words.

I couldn't sleep soundly at night - screwing that many people over in the long run - but I guess different people are driven by different things.

(AC - because I'm inside a company that isn't going to survive because of his "bright" ideas - all of which will make him wealthy (ier).

[Daniel B.]

Money over enterprise health

As the AC pointed out, Icahn is a destroyer of companies. Thanks to his wankfest, BEA got 0wned by Oracle. I think my beloved WebLogic's going down...

AC got it spot on, basically "shareholder value" matters more than the actual companies' health these days. "Shareholder value" killed Computer City under CompUSA's hands, I wonder if those shareholders even care about all those people losing their jobs because of "shareholder value". Nice projects get axed because of takeovers/mergers, companies die, but all is well and fine as long as shareholders get their money. If the company tries to actually stand up and look for whats best for the COMPANY ... they get sued by stupid shareholders, like Yahoo! or BEA last year.

The entire "public company" system seems to be like that old Dilbert strip I once read: "The company would steal our organs during our sleep and sell them in the black market if it was profitable enough!". Pretty much sums up how it works.

[tardigrade]

Hard Love - NOT!

Even if the Yahoo! board does need tinkering with, Mr Icahn is bad, bad news. This will destroy Yahoo! for the benefit of a few shareholders pockets. As long as the shareholders get their $34 a share the consequences seem meaningless to him. Will this bother him?

In the words of Mr Icahn himself, "Maybe I made a mistake, but I made $300m on it. So is that so bad?"

Note: Can someone please fix the amanfrommars bot it's permanently producing meaningless pap.