![What is behind the recent acquisition of Yahoo for Verizon? [Source: Verizon Communications]](http://www.jstudentboard.com/reporter/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/8-15-verizon.jpg)
[Source: Verizon Communications]
Verizon, a major telecommunications firm with an estimated worth of $206.2 billion dollars, is relatively stagnant in terms of sales in the market. The company has been looking for ways to expand and increase sales drastically. Its purchase of Yahoo provides obvious evidence that it sees the web and its assets as important aspects of growth.
Through the purchase, Verizon can utilize applicable parts of Yahoo including email, web search, news, “Tumblr,” “Flickr,” and most importantly, the power to use advertisements. In this way, Verizon can increase sales because companies must pay in order to display their ads on Yahoo in hopes of informing new customers about their products and services. Why else would Verizon invest so much money into a fading and declining web company?
In the long run for Verizon, Yahoo’s ability to provide meaningful and significant web tools enables Verizon to become a part of the international spectrum of media and telecommunications. Through advertising, Verizon wants to generate revenue to fund company expansion and attract more customers.
Recently, Verizon has been looking for a way to overtake tech giants Facebook and Google and emerge as the top tech corporation. Consequently, Verizon purchased AOL last year for similar reasons as they did for Yahoo this year. In the best case scenario, Verizon will be able to integrate advertisement and web usage into telecommunications via Yahoo and AOL.
Additionally, one must not forget that Verizon currently owns and manages two other platforms: Huffington Post and TechCrunch. These two popular sources of news can complement Yahoo and AOL and help Verizon “go big.” With the collective support of all these companies, Verizon should be able to increase ad revenue and potentially offer telecommunications packages with features such as news, social interaction, and so on.
Verizon’s most recent business venture, however, does not guarantee future success for the company. Maybe Verizon will be unable to utilize Yahoo, and the whole scheme will turn out to be a pig in a poke. Maybe not. But simply acquiring Yahoo will not be enough — Verizon must continue to innovate if it wants to become an integral and functional part of both the web and telecommunications.
