CNN BUSINESS | Verizon offloads Yahoo and AOL in $5 billion deal

Verizon Media CEO Guru Gowrappan appears at a 2019 event.

New York (CNN Business) – Verizon is exiting the media business, announcing Monday that it’s selling the unit for $5 billion to private equity firm Apollo Global Management.

The sale includes AOL and Yahoo, which Verizon bought for a combined $9 billion in recent years. Verizon will retain a 10% stake in the spin off and the Verizon Media Group name will be changed to just Yahoo.

Verizon once had great plans to become a dominant player in the online media and ad business. The telephone company bought AOL for $4.4 billion in 2015 and further bolstered its portfolio with its Yahoo purchase at a similar price in 2017. The unit was briefly named Oath, but Verizon admitted that its plans to take on Amazon (AMZN), Google (GOOG) and Facebook (FBwas essentially a waste when it took a $4.6 billion writedown on Oath in 2018.  –read more—