Yahoo Board to Meet Sunday to Think Over $1.1 Billion Tumblr Acquisition

According to a report by All Things D, sources close to the situation surrounding the rumored Yahoo acquisition of Tumblr, say the Yahoo board plans to meet Sunday night to decide whether to approve a $1.1 billion all-cash Tumblr acquisition.

A Tumblr acquisition by Yahoo is said to be an important part of Marissa Mayer’s strategy for the future of Yahoo.  The hope would be to attract younger audiences with the kind of user-generated content that Tumblr has pioneered and used to generate its huge growth. While the deal could fall apart at the last minute, for now, sources have told All Things D that the agreement was still in place as of today.  If the deal is approved by Yahoo’s board, it will be announced Monday.

It’s also worth noting that Yahoo has already said it has news to announce then as well, so either it’s overly confident the deal will go through or there’s also other news to announce on Monday as well.

Tumblr CEO David Karp would continue to operate the business, with Mayer promising him a level of autonomy, despite the need to also integrate closely with Yahoo.  And apparently, Karp will also be locked in via a four-year deal that will reward him for performance of the business.

Yahoo has been super busy with acquisitions recently, with apps such as Summly. However, if the Tumblr acquisition goes through it will be the biggest acquisition in the Mayer-Yahoo regime by far.  And it will also be one of the biggest tech acquisitions of late, even topping the $1 billion acquisition of Instgram that Facebook made this past summer.