SAN FRANCISCO: Yahoo Inc co-founder Jerry Yang resigned from the struggling Internet company yesterday.
Yang, who started Yahoo in 1995, is leaving the company’s board of directors as well as all other positions within the company effective yesterday, Yahoo said.
The move comes two weeks after Yahoo appointed Scott Thompson to serve as its new CEO.
Shares of Yahoo were up 3.4 per cent at US$15.97 in after-hours trading yesterday.
In a letter to Yahoo’s chairman of the board, cited in yesterday’s announcement, Yang said he was leaving Yahoo to pursue “other interests outside of Yahoo” and said he was “enthusiastic” about Thompson to lead the company to a successful future.
Yang, whose official title is “co-founder and chief Yahoo”, is also resigning from the boards of Yahoo Japan and Alibaba Group Holdings, the company said.
Respected in the industry as one of the founding figures of the Web, Yang has come under fire from investors over the years.
In 2008 while Yang was serving as CEO, Yahoo rejected an unsolicited takeover bid from Microsoft Corp worth about US$44 billion. Its share price was subsequently pummelled during the global financial crisis and its current market value is about US$20 billion.
More recently, Yang and Yahoo chairman of the board Roy Bostock, have been criticised by some large Yahoo shareholders for their handling of the “strategic review” the company was pursuing, in which discussions have included the possibility of being sold, taken private or broken up. – Reuters