Microsoft has been so cagey about the candidates it plans to nominate to Yahoo!’s board that speculation is mounting that the software giant actually doesn’t have anyone lined up.
The word on Wall Street and in technology circles is that the Redmond, Wash.-based company has had a list of candidates drawn up since early March, but that the company is having difficulty getting people to sign on.
One Silicon Valley source said there’s no incentive for people under consideration to become board nominees because a deal is widely seen as likely being done on friendly terms.
Also holding people back is the worry that if negotiations turn nasty, would-be nominees, by being part of a hostile takeover attempt, risk alienating both Yahoo! insiders and others who are aligned with the search giant.
Microsoft on Feb. 1 went public with a $44 billion takeover offer for Yahoo! that sent the search engine company scrambling to find an alternative to merging with the company behind Windows and Xbox.
The deal is seen as a make or break deal for Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, who has staked both his reputation and the company’s ability to do battle with Web titan Google.
Microsoft can’t nominate any of its own employees since takeover law prohibits people who work for an acquirer in a hostile deal of being nominated to the board of a target company.
According to a source close to the situation, Microsoft asked former Netscape CFO and current Sun Microsystems and CNET board member Peter Currie to be a candidate, but he turned down the offer.
Two other sources – including one who works for Microsoft – said Tom Freston was also a candidate, but the former Viacom CEO told The Post he isn’t involved.
“I know nothing about it, no one from Microsoft has talked to me about it,” Freston said. “Maybe they were thinking of another Tom Freston.”
Another name that has surfaced is Leo Hindery, the cable industry veteran who was once head of TCI Communications and AT&T Broadband, and who is friendly with Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates.
However, sources close to Hindery, said that he like Freston has not discussed the possibility of being a candidate with Microsoft.
Currie and Hindery did not respond to calls for comment.
Other sources familiar with the matter dispute that Microsoft is having trouble putting its slate together, noting that the company has signed up 10 board candidates and two alternates and is ready to pull the trigger on nominating them if and when it has to.
Microsoft has 10 days to nominate its slate of directors once Yahoo! announces the date of its annual shareholders meeting.