New Yahoo CEO: Fix It and Flip It

We’ve seen much kerfuffle the past day-plus regarding the hiring of ex-Google product guru Marissa Mayer as Yahoo’s new CEO – the fifth Yahoo CEO in about a year. Most of the discussions have built around how Ms. Mayer can or will turn Yahoo around, bringing her Google product magic to a quietly-fading former web star.

In an era and environment obsessed with The Next Big Thing, Yahoo seems like slowly-cooling toast. In fact, the company is one of the largest web/Cloud portals, and it is profitable. But we must also admit that Yahoo is alive mainly because of its long-established, slowly-declining user base. In that way, Yahoo very closely resembles AOL – once the highest-flying web provider of all time, now a reasonably profitable web/Cloud content portal and messaging provider with a hard core of users, trying to find more and better ways to profit from a wide range of content.

But content was never really king when it comes to web/Cloud presence, because content is everywhere and available at low/no cost. The real value of content is its utility within the context of the user experience, partly for the user, but more for those who wish to derive revenue from the user. Google has been able to derive value for users and advertisers from its combined scale and utility in finding, aggregating, and presenting content in a specific user context – i.e, search. Google has found much more limited revenue success in other endeavors, including its own iGoogle content aggregation portal service, which is slated for closure in late 2013.

It’s very possible that Mayer will find/develop/refine some means of improving Yahoo’s ability to deliver content-based value for users and those who wish to profit from users. But in our opinion, the most important and successful thing she is likely to do for Yahoo is to productize and then sell pieces of the company. In fact, we believe that Mayer’s primary mission, and the reason she was recruited, is to review and refine how the various parts or Yahoo are or should be productized, with an eye toward selling off those products. Someone with Google vision and experience is much more likely to see the business and technology opportunities in such a situation. To our way of thinking, it makes little if any sense to poach such a high-profile Cloud/web executive in any other context.

Bruce Guptill

Most research firms can explain what happened; some can explain what is happening. Saugatuck Technology excels at understanding both in order to explain what else is likely to occur, and to guide its clients toward the actions that deliver them the greatest business value while enabling the safest business path.
To accomplish this, and to continually improve the value of Saugatuck’s work to clients in a Cloud-obscured marketplace, Saugatuck SVP and Head of Research Bruce Guptill pushes his team to continually re-examine and re-invent the company’s research programs to focus more on the costs, benefits, effects, and value of an ever-changing mix of technologies and providers in different markets.
Guptill’s own technology and business background laid a solid foundation for such a flexible, yet stable, approach to IT research value for clients. His technology research work includes mobility, collaborative IT, telecom, data networking, web commerce, and electronic marketplaces; his research work for enterprise IT and business clients includes return on IT investment, total cost of IT ownership, and business planning for IT. His research and guidance on vendor channel management, market identification and development, and buyer behavior analysis has enabled hundreds of established and startup IT providers to find, enter, and profit from new and traditional markets, while helping to guide user enterprise leaders toward optimal IT procurement and vendor management.
Guptill’s research background includes several years as a VP and research director with Gartner, senior positions with TeleChoice and Robert Frances Group, and editorial work within the IDG companies, including four years as a writer and editor with NetworkWorld. His marketing business focus was honed as VP of marketing for firms ranging from custom development providers to non-IT firms in aviation and other industries. His sales and channel experience started by traveling with a sample bag, then working for IT VARs, then advising telecom and wireless carriers on partner choices, to developing partner programs for traditional and Cloud-based software development firms and ISVs.
Guptill holds an MBA in marketing and finance, and a BA in the psychology and business of mass media communication. He is licensed to fly airplanes, drive boats, and sell houses; he is also a certified baseball coach, serves on the boards of regional civic groups, and is a serial home renovator. Married with three children, Guptill resides on Cape Cod in southeastern Massachusetts, and is a lifelong fan of the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics, and the University of Connecticut Huskies.

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