Big changes at Yahoo! as Jerry Yang takes over as CEO

Yahoo! announced on Monday that it has appointed board member and Yahoo! co-founder, Jerry Yang, as the company’s new CEO. Yang takes over from Terry Semel, who will now act as a non-executive chairman and assist the senior management in decision-making. In another appointment, Susan Decker, former executive vice-president and head of Advertiser and Publisher Group, has been made president of the company.

In a letter to the board of directors, Semel wrote, “This is the time for new executive leadership, with different skills and strengths, to step in and drive the company to realise its full potential – it is the right thing to do, and the right time is now.”

Apart from Yahoo!, Yang also serves on the boards of Cisco Systems, Yahoo! Japan, and Alibaba, the manufacturing directory.

David Filo will continue to play an important role in the management team, overseeing its technology organisation. The company is still looking for a new chief technology officer after Farzad Nazem resigned from the position in May.