Microsoft Exec Likely To Lead Yahoo!

There will be a significant changing of the guard at Yahoo! if Microsoft succeeds in buying it.

It's practically a given that a Microsoft executive would run the struggling Internet giant and that Yahoo! Founder and Chief Executive Jerry Yang would leave soon after the deal closes.

A few Microsoft executives are poised to step in. The top candidates are Kevin Johnson, president of platforms and services; Brian McAndrews, senior vice president, advertiser and publisher solutions group; Steve Berkowitz, senior vice president, online services group; and Debra Chrapaty, corporate vice president, global foundation services.

Microsoft has been diversifying its executive bench steadily over the past few years.

Rob Helm, director of research firm Directions on Microsoft, sees McAndrews, Berkowitz or Chrapaty having day-to-day management responsibility over the Sunnyvale, Calif., company, and he or she would report to Johnson.

Helm says McAndrews might have the inside track, because Microsoft wants to become a stronger competitor to Google in search advertising. McAndrews was chief executive of aQuantive , an online advertising company Microsoft acquired last year. He even appears to be lobbying to run Yahoo!. Read More>>