Yahoo Board to Yang: Save the Drama for Your Mama

Seems the Yahoo board’s “unanimous” rejection of Microsoft’s $40 billion-plus bid for the company may not have been so unanimous after all. According to the New York Post, the board is actually split over the issue.

On one side is Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, Eric Hippeau, a managing partner at Softbank Capital Partners and a longtime Yahoo (YHOO) director, and Robert Kotick, chairman and CEO of Activision, who all oppose the bid. On the other is a group led by Yahoo Chairman Roy Bostock and billionaire investor Ron Burkle, who fear Yang has allowed his emotions to get the better of him and forgotten about his fiduciary duty to Yahoo shareholders. And in the absence of a compelling alternative strategy, that could expose the company to litigation.

“The emotional part of Yang would rather do anything but sell to Microsoft,” (MSFT) a source close to the company told the Post. “But he doesn’t have the cards to come up with a value-creating, competitive alternative for shareholders.”