Marketing and all things related

The time for niceties is over.  In a letter dated April 5th, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer told the Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO) board of directors that the end is near, and they have three weeks to accept Microsoft's bid to takeover Yahoo! or else. 

If Yahoo! doesn't respond within three weeks (by the April 26th deadline), Microsoft will take its bid to Yahoo!'s shareholders, which will include a proxy contest that will basically oust the existing board of directors.  But that's not the end of Microsoft's threats.  If Yahoo! doesn't respond within three weeks, Microsoft will also drop the value of their bid.  In reference to not making a decision before the deadline, the letter from Steve Ballmer states, "That action will have an undesirable impact on the value of your company from our perspective which will be reflected in the terms of our proposal."

So what does this threat-laden letter mean aside from trying to get the Yahoo! board of directors to agree to the proposed merger if they want to keep their positions?  Well, it's really not a new tactic, but it's certainly not one that's going to help Microsoft's brand image in the eyes of the public who already sees the company as a bit of a bully.  With Steve Ballmer at the helm, that reputation has only gotten worse. 

On the other hand, Yahoo! has been citing the Microsoft offer as too low despite the original offer being a 62% premium to Yahoo's stock price.  The powers that be at Yahoo! have been trying to find a better deal from companies like News Corp. (NYSE: NWS) and Time Warner's AOL (NYSE: TWX) division, but nothing has come to fruition yet.

What do you think?  Can Yahoo! escape Microsoft's bully tactics or is this merger inevitable?