Carol Bartz’s first blog post announcing a new management structure for Yahoo was missing any actual details of the changes, but the company has now been briefing on what the new CEO has in mind.
Yahoo is combining its Tech and Product groups into a single organisation called, rather unimaginatively, Products. Ari Balogh, the chief technology officer who joined from Verisign only a year ago, is the coming man who has been put in charge.
This does not mean that Ash Patel, EVP of the previous Audience Product Division, is the going man, but he does appear to be lower down the pecking order now as leader of some kind of Product Evangelist group.
Yahoo has divided itself into two regions – North America and International. Before it was US, Europe, Asia Pacific and Emerging Markets. Hilary Schneider, EVP Yahoo US, stays in charge of North America with an International leader to be “hired soon”. Both regions report directly to the CEO.
The new head of Global Mobile Business, David Ko, will report to Ms Schneider. This division replaces Connected Life, whose EVP Marco Boerries is leaving the company, it was announced this week. Ko had been a deputy to Boerries.
Then there is Bartz’s first major appointment. She has created the role of Chief Marketing Officer for Elisa Steele, who will join from Netapp on March 23.
Given all the upheaval and departures over the past two years, Ms Bartz wants the new arrangements to stick.
“This structure is designed to last two to four years; however, we’ll continue to make adjustments as needed. But we expect this core structure will stay in place,” said a Yahoo spokesperson.
So the major departures unveiled this week have been Boerries, Neeraj Khemlani, the head of Yahoo’s News and Information division, who is joining Hearst, and the CFO Blake Jorgensen, who will hang around until a successor is appointed.
By the way , Sue Decker, Yahoo’s president, who missed out on the CEO’s job and announced her departure in January, has not left the building yet. The spokesperson said she was “still transitioning.”
