Bill Gates
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
Let me know when I do and tell me if it rhymes with shmally baba.
Let me know when I do and tell me if it rhymes with shmally baba.
What are they smoking? Keep going. So here's how to pull it apart. Yahoo had about 15% market share of search, which I think was number two. Google was way, way, way ahead. And so on the face of it, you're thinking, wait, $47 billion to buy 15% market share in search? But there's actually two other assets in here. There's Yahoo Japan. Yep. And there's a stake in Alibaba. Not just a stake.
What are they smoking? Keep going. So here's how to pull it apart. Yahoo had about 15% market share of search, which I think was number two. Google was way, way, way ahead. And so on the face of it, you're thinking, wait, $47 billion to buy 15% market share in search? But there's actually two other assets in here. There's Yahoo Japan. Yep. And there's a stake in Alibaba. Not just a stake.
Which famously is one of the greatest investments of all time.
Which famously is one of the greatest investments of all time.
So collectively, those two assets together are worth over $30 billion. So if you back it out, it's really only like $15 billion to buy 15% of the search market.
So collectively, those two assets together are worth over $30 billion. So if you back it out, it's really only like $15 billion to buy 15% of the search market.
So would you want to pay a billion dollars per percent of market share of that market? Yeah, sure. It's just money. Why not? I mean, it's the craziest thing. This would have been ludicrously profitable to spend only $15 to buy 15% of the search market, which is way bigger than $100 billion and still growing.
So would you want to pay a billion dollars per percent of market share of that market? Yeah, sure. It's just money. Why not? I mean, it's the craziest thing. This would have been ludicrously profitable to spend only $15 to buy 15% of the search market, which is way bigger than $100 billion and still growing.
Yes. Now, because this is counterfactual and we actually don't know what would have happened, Yahoo completely went away. They sold for $5 billion in their most recent transaction to be co-owned by Verizon and Apollo. So there's this real question of like, okay, if Microsoft bought all that traffic, would they actually have been able to harness it and build a Google-like business?
Yes. Now, because this is counterfactual and we actually don't know what would have happened, Yahoo completely went away. They sold for $5 billion in their most recent transaction to be co-owned by Verizon and Apollo. So there's this real question of like, okay, if Microsoft bought all that traffic, would they actually have been able to harness it and build a Google-like business?
Or would it have just gone the way that Yahoo was going to go anyway? But to make the bull case on that, Bing is a good business. It just has a small market share. Microsoft succeeded finally in 2009 at attracting all the right talent and taking it really seriously and building a super viable search engine that does, I don't know, something like a billion a year in profit.
Or would it have just gone the way that Yahoo was going to go anyway? But to make the bull case on that, Bing is a good business. It just has a small market share. Microsoft succeeded finally in 2009 at attracting all the right talent and taking it really seriously and building a super viable search engine that does, I don't know, something like a billion a year in profit.
Where did you find that? It's in his book. Oh, my gosh. It's in Hit Refresh. I always thought he was in the marketing side. Well, at Microsoft, product managers are marketers. They don't live in the engineering org.
Where did you find that? It's in his book. Oh, my gosh. It's in Hit Refresh. I always thought he was in the marketing side. Well, at Microsoft, product managers are marketers. They don't live in the engineering org.