Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer. Image: Eirik Solheim/Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Marissa Mayer is in for a golden parachute package that includes $3m in cash.
Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer is to receive a $23m severance package following the closing of Verizon’s $4.48bn acquisition of the company.
Both Mayer and CFO Ken Goldman will continue to serve in their roles until the acquisition is concluded. According to an SEC filing, they will step down after the sale closes.
A new company called Altaba, which will hold Yahoo’s minority stake in Alibaba, will be led by CEO Thomas McInerney.
The $4.48bn acquisition is expected to close in the second quarter of 2017.
A number of high-profile data breaches saw telecoms giant Verizon reduce the value of the deal by $350m.
As part of the termination deal, Mayer will receive $3m in cash, $20m in equity and $25,000 in continuing medical benefits, according to the filing.
Mayer attempted to turn Yahoo juggernaut around
Stanford graduate Mayer joined Google in 1999 as the 20th employee, and was the company’s first female engineer.
She oversaw the layout of Google’s simplistic home page, helped to establish the company’s AdWords business and held key roles in Search, Images, News, Books, Toolbar, iGoogle and Gmail.
In 2012, Mayer became CEO of Yahoo and within a year, she brought all remote-working staff back into the fold. She led a $1.1bn acquisition of Tumblr and instituted a performance review system based on a bell curve ranking.
Inner ructions aside, Mayer’s biggest task was to return a flagging former tech superstar to relevancy, including new mobile ads strategies.
Despite her best efforts, the company did not turn a corner and Yahoo stock continued to slide, igniting activist investors’ fury.
In July 2016, Verizon confirmed it had agreed to purchase Yahoo’s core internet business for $4.83bn.
Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer. Image: Eirik Solheim/Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)
