It appears Verizon is part of a field of at least three following the close of the first round of bids for Yahoo’s assets.
According to a report from Bloomberg, Verizon’s bid will be up against competing offers from private equity firm TPG and digital advertising business YP Holdings LLC, formerly known as Yellowpages.com.
The report comes at the close of the first round of bidding for Yahoo’s struggling web business. The deadline for the submission of initial bids was Monday. Other potential suitors, including AT&T, Alphabet, Comcast, Time, and Microsoft, reportedly decided against bidding this time, according to the Wall Street Journal.
But there may still be a surprise player in the mix.
Though Bloomberg’s report didn’t mention a bid from SoftBank, the company was reportedly eyeing the acquisition of Yahoo in its entirety.
According to a New York Post article published last week, SoftBank president Nikesh Arora was considering a pass at scooping up the company, but was holding off on bidding to see where Verizon’s offer landed first.
The move would be a strategic buy for SoftBank, which already owns a 43 percent stake in Yahoo Japan and paid $90 million in royalties in 2015 for use of the Yahoo Japan brand name.
Verizon’s bid is also a calculated bet as it looks to strengthen its content business and go90 mobile video platform. Of particular interest to Verizon in this case is the audience of one billion users on Yahoo’s email, finance, sports and video sites, as well as its exclusive content. Both could help Verizon gain traction as a major player in video advertising, Bloomberg said.
Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam said in February some of Yahoo’s assets would make a good fit for the carrier’s AOL business, which Verizon sees as a future growth engine for the company.
According to a previous report from Bloomberg, Verizon would give Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer the boot and combine Yahoo and AOL under the direction of Verizon executive vice president Marni Walden and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong.