Search results for "time warner"
AOL Spinoff to Occur on December 9, 2009
Last spring, Time Warner announced that it would spin off AOL as an independent company. The announcement was made shortly after hiring Tim Armstrong away from Google as President. This fall, they've named members to the future Board of Directors and hired key financial executives needed to run the publicly traded company. Now, we know that AOL's independence day is December 9, 2009. All Time Warner stockholders as of 5pm on November 27, 2009 will receive 1 AOL share for every 11 shares of Time Warner. AOL has openly talked about their focus on content, in ways reminiscent of Yahoo!...
AOL Completes Financial Team, Names Additional Board Member in Advance
In preparation for being spun off from Time Warner, AOL has hired executives to their financial team and announced one additional board member. Here's a list of the financial execs: Mike Suffredini - Vice President and Treasurer Eoin Ryan - Vice President of Investor Relations Don Neff, currently a Senior Vice President of Finance, will become Senior Vice President of Internal Audit. Ned Brody - rejoining the company as Executive Vice President of Paid Services Meanwhile, Susan Lyne, Chief Executive Officer of the online luxury retailer Gilt Groupe, Inc. has been named to the Board of Directors. Last week, AOL...
AOL Ad Revenues Decline by 18% in Q3 2009
Time Warner has reported its earnings for the third quarter of 2009 and the news isn't so pretty for AOL. Overall revenues declined 23% to $777 million. The decline resulted from an 18% decrease in advertising revenues as well as a 29% decline in subscription revenues. Time Warner said the decline in ad revenues was due to lower paid search and display ads on AOL Media, reduced ad sales on third party sites and foreign exchange rates. AOL averaged 102 million U.S. unique visitors per month and 44 billion domestic page views, which translates to 144 pages per unique visitor....
AOL Names Nine Board Members for Post-Time Warner Separation
Once AOL is spinned off from Time Warner, it will require a Board of Directors. Today, nine members were named. They are: Richard L. Dalzell made a name for himself at Amazon, where he started held a variety of executive-level roles from 1997 until 2007. Prior to Amazon, Dalzell was VP of Information Systems at Walmart. Karen E. Dykstra is a partner at Plainfield Asset Management LLC, and has been COO and CFO of Plainfield Direct Inc. since 2006. Plainfield manages investment capital for institutions and high net worth individuals. Prior to joining Plainfield, Dykstra was the CFO of Automatic...
AOL Advertising Revenue Down by 21% in Q2 2009
AOL parent company Time Warner released its quarterly earnings this morning and the news is not pretty. Revenue came in at $804 million, a decrease of 24% over Q2 2008, which brought in $1.06 billion. The decline was almost evenly split among online advertising ($111 million, a 21% decrease) and internet access subscriptions ($135 million, a 27% decrease). Time Warner has spent $20 million so far in the process of prepping AOL to become a separate, independent company. Earlier this week, Time Warner bought back Google's 5% stake in AOL for $283 million, a big dip from Google's original $1...
Time Warner Buys Back Google's 5% Stake in AOL
When the Time Warner board voted in late May to spin off AOL, buying back Google's 5% stake in the company would be a prerequisite for the sale. This week, Time Warner did just that. The return on investment, however, was not so hot. Google invested $1 billion in 2005 to acquired the 5% stake. They only got back $283 million. Other statements made in the filing are quite telling of the possibilities for AOL's future. Google currently powers the search on AOL (including paid search). That will be in place until December 19, 2010, but they're leaving open the...
Time Warner Board Approves Plans to Spinoff AOL
The Time Warner Board has voted and AOL will be spun off into an independent company. Right now, Time Warner owns 95% of AOL and Google owns the other 5%. Time Warner plans to buy back the 5% Google stake in the third quarter of 2009 before it spins off AOL. Brand spankin' new AOL CEO (and former Google VP) Tim Armstrong had this to say: This will be a great opportunity for AOL, our employees and our partners. Becoming a standalone public company positions AOL to strengthen its core businesses, deliver new and innovative products and services, and enhance...
AOL Ad Revenues Drop 20% in Q1 2009
Time Warner, parent company of AOL, has reported their first quarter earnings for 2009 and the news isn't great for AOL. Ad revenues have dropped 20% or $109 million. The losses largely contributed to the 7% decline parent company Time Warner experienced overall. The losses added to Time Warner's desire to rid itself of AOL. "With our separation of Time Warner Cable, Time Warner has become a more content-focused company. We're also working to determine the right ownership structure for AOL," said Time Warner Chairman and CEO Jeff Bewkes. "With our powerful brands, industry-leading scale, track record of innovation, heightened...
4/1/09: We Won't Get Fooled Again (Puts On Sunglasses)
It's that time of year. April Fool's Day. What's news and what's fake? Here are the jokes for 4/1/09: Live Search Hotspots Which reminds me of this video from Qualcomm: (This is an image, click to go to the page with the video - couldn't embed, sorry) YouTube revealed a new layout, which made viewing Jeffrey Wooten's Punch List even more interesting than usual today. Google CADIE (Cognitive Autoheuristic Distributed-Intelligence Entity) CADIE can even search your brain for that word that's on the tip of your tongue. Gmail Autopilot Yahoo introduced Ideological Search so you can stop thinking for yourself....
Report: Jonathan Miller to Run NewsCorp's Digital Unit
AOL's former Chief Executive Jonathan Miller has been approached by NewsCorp to head up their digital unit, according to reports. Miller is under a non-compete agreement with AOL, but that expires within days. The agreement prevented Miller from joining Yahoo!'s expanded board, a compromise with investor Carl Icahn last summer during the Microsoft acquisition aftermath. Currently, Miller is a partner at investment firm Velocity Interactive Group. He left AOL in 2006. Last fall, it was rumored that he wanted to buy Yahoo, but it turned out he was raising funds for Velocity, not a Yahoo purchase. NewsCorp is the parent...
Dennis Woodside Tapped to Replace Tim Armstrong at Google
Dennis Woodside has been tapped to replace Tim Armstrong at Google. Woodside was formerly Google's VP of U.K., Benelux, and Ireland. Armstrong was Sr. VP and based in New York. Last week, AOL announced that Armstrong had been selected as their new CEO. Armstrong will take over for Randy Falco. AOL is owned by parent company Time Warner. It's no secret that AOL needs new direction. The company spent last year of attempting to strike some kind of merger or acquisition with Microsoft and/or Yahoo! Time Warner also decided to split AOL into two: one part media and one part...
Google's Tim Armstrong Named Chairman and CEO of AOL
Google Senior Vice President Tim Armstrong has been tapped to replace Randy Falco as Chairman and CEO of AOL. "Tim is the right executive to move AOL into the next phase of its evolution. At Google, Armstrong helped build one of the most successful media teams in the history of the Internet -- helping to make Google the most popular online search advertising platform in the world for direct and brand marketers," said Jeff Bewkes, Chairman and CEO of Time Warner, parent company of AOL. "He's an advertising pioneer with a stellar reputation and proven track record. We are privileged...
AOL Not the Bright Spot in Time Warner's Q4 2008 Earnings
While search was a bright spot in the earnings of Yahoo and Microsoft, and Google beat Wall Street estimates, AOL is not faring as well. Time Warner released its 2008 fourth quarter earnings and AOL lost 18% in ad revenue. Last year, Time Warner announced that it would split AOL into two: media and internet access. The access division didn't fare any better with subscriptions down 27%. Time Warner has been trying to sell AOL. In the past year, they've talked to both Microsoft and Yahoo about a deal, but so far nothing has been negotiated....
AOL to Cut 10% of Its Workforce
AOL will cut 10% of its workforce, according to Kara Swisher. That amounts to 700 employees. The cuts will attempt to focus efforts in New York City, part of a gradual attempt to headquarter there. That will mean consolidation in Silicon Valley, Los Angeles, and the DC suburb of Dulles, site of the original HQ. It will also scaled down international business, which hasn't served them well. Last year, parent company Time Warner announced that it would split AOL into two: one part internet access and one part search/media. Time Warner has been attempting to forge a merger or sale...
50 Most Memorable Moments in Search for 2008
It was one heck of a year for the search industry. The convergence of outside economic forces, a wild presidential election and the 2008 Beijing Olympics were all signs of an industry becoming more and more mainstream and global. Here's a look at the completely subjective biggest stories in search from 2008: Microsoft Makes Unsolicited Offer for Yahoo! - On February 1, one of tech's biggest companies made a generous offer of $31 a share for the number two search engine. CEO Jerry Yang was defiant in his stance that the company he founded over 10 years ago would remain...
Big Music Companies in Negotiations to Form Hulu-Like Site
The Music Companies versus YouTube debacle continues to unravel one bit at at time. Now, Silicon Alley Insider is reporting that Warner, Universal, Sony and others are in talks to create their own Hulu-like site for music videos. The music labels are "only" making a max of $25,000 per month off of ad revenues from YouTube. But that's only half the story. The real money is made from a pay-per-play licensing deal. To be making this kind of direct money off of music videos, which have only been used as a marketing tool up to this point, is a big...
Warner Music Not as Thrilled As Universal, Says Goodbye to YouTube
After writing about how Universal Music is making tens of millions from YouTube this year, I was surprised to see Warner Music withdraw from YouTube. Round up the usual suspect for the reasons why they've bailed: Warner Music wants more money from the advertising revenue being brought in. Nevermind that YouTube has been struggling to monetize itself. Nevermind that the music industry is struggling since the fall of the cd and the rise of the mp3. Nevermind the current crappy economy. Warner wants more money. They didn't get it, so they bailed on the money they were getting. In a...
AOL Ad Revenues Drop 6% in Q3 2008
Revenue for AOL's advertising dropped 6% in the third quarter of 2008. Total revenues for AOL dropped 17% but that's primarily due to declining subscription rates. AOL is in the midst of a business model shift - from one based on internet access subscriptions to one based on advertising. That shift, of course, is coming at quite the rough economic patch for the country in general. AOL is also looking into joining forces with Yahoo, who also posted dismal Q3 results. Both companies expect Q4 to be even worse....
New Yahoo Board Approves Talks with AOL
Yahoo's new board of directors met on Tuesday and approved new talks with Time Warner regarding a possible sale of AOL. Yahoo recently expanded its board to 11 members, adding investor Carl Icahn in a settlement after his attempt to takeover the company with a new board. Frank Biondi and John Chapple also joined the board. AOL has also been going through some changes, refocusing its business model on media and not on internet access. Subscriptions to its internet access product have declined in recent years due to the increased (and ironic for the Time Warner-owned AOL) broadband high speed...
AOL Confirms SocialThing Acquisition
While not yet complete, AOL has confirmed that they will acquire SocialThing. The FriendFeed competitor is still in private beta. No word on the price for the acquisition, but expect it to be small. Still, AOL seems to be going after the social media world, having recently acquired social network Bebo for $850 million. Bebo has 40 million users, doubling AOL's media reach via the acquisition. The push towards social media is likely part of a larger re-focus of AOL's business model around advertising. AOL parent company Time Warner recently confirmed that AOL will be split into two businesses: internet...
