The Biz of Coding

Yahoo Inc. & eBay Inc. Alliance — How will Google, AOL, & MSN Respond

by Ujwal Tickoo on May 26th, 2006

In my previous post  Dot Com War 2.0 — eBay Inc. & Yahoo! join forces  I had referred to Yahoo’s (YHOO) and eBay’s (EBAY) joining forces as the precursor for Dot Com War 2.0.

The 3 key players are Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft. Whatever the outcome, the online world is changed forever due to this alliance between the world’s largest eCommerce Online Service – eBay Inc. and the world’s most trafficked Web Portal — Yahoo! Inc.

Microsoft’s Reaction

I don’t expect Microsoft (MSFT) to sit silent. Though right now what is announced is only a US based partnership — it has the potential to evolve into a world-wide alliance and what some analysts feel even a merger.

Google’s Reaction

What would be interesting is to see Google’s response. For long there have been rumours of Google’s version of Pay Pal. Google already had Google Base. Now that eBay has clearly sided with Yahoo! Google doesnt have much to lose in building its eCommerce capabilities and leveraging its top ranking web search engine to drive traffic to Google’s Online Marketplace.

I also expect Google to have a hard look at buying/deeply-partnering with AOL. Quite different from its current strategy of only buying small start-ups with complementory technology.

What about AOL?

It currently has some value for Google due to its established user base, portal, adverstising revenue and traffic.

AOL — stand alone – will most become a second rung Online player. Most probably it will end up with either Google or Microsoft — initially in a partnership and later as an acquisition.

POSTED IN: AOL, Google, Maketing, Management, Strategy, Yahoo, eBay