"Every time there is a strong company in the Valley, it leads to innovation. The number of new innovators that had Google people in them is huge and that's her tribe. She knows that tribe really well, she's been in touch with that tribe, she is respected by that tribe, that is a competitive advantage for her in acquisitions," Winblad said.
Mayer, who took over as CEO of Yahoo in July, is expected to be on the company's earnings conference call Monday afternoon. While Mayer has yet to reveal many details about her long-term vision for the company, investors are hoping that she will shed some light on her plans during the call.
While Yahoo has struggled in competing against other Internet companies like Facebook and Google for online advertising revenue on desktops, all web companies are now having to deal with how to make money from advertising on the mobile platform, which puts Yahoo on an even playing field with its competitors, Winblad said.
"This is a big experiment in the tech industry. Everyone is a 2.0 company now whether they want to be or not. Google, Microsoft even Amazon is going to have to deal with mobile sooner versus later. So it's jump ball and she is going to enter the court strongly with everybody else," Winblad said. "The deck is stacked in her favor, but it's going to require a lot of skill and a lot of competition for talent."
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