Top Yahoo! Execs Bail

Yesterday, rumors of Yahoos being contacted by recruiting companies surfaced, after two weeks of secrecy. Apparently, there’s a strong craving for Jerry Yang’s employees that feeds off of Microsoft taking over and the layoffs that started happening yesterday. Not such a good time for Yahoo, despite the confidence that emanated from refusing the unsolicited bid.

Amid troubled times, two of the top people at the Sunnyvale-based company have said their final goodbyes to the company that made them international tech stars. The first one to jump ships is Bradley Horowitz, the head of Yahoo!’s Technology Division, who betrayed the colors he flew with pride and accepted an offer from former arch-enemy Google. Apparently, he will be going to partner with Joe Kraus, the director of product management and the head of Google’s OpenSocial initiative, according to Tech Crunch’s Michael Arrington.

He leaves behind several successful products and acquisitions, more notable the Yahoo! Desktop Search and the Yahoo Toolbar, respectively the Flickr deal that brought the Sunnyvale-based company the best photograph sharing platform on the Internet (according to statistics based on social network usage of the product).

Horowitz will be joined by Brickhouse head Salim Ismail walking out the front door, as the latter accepted the package offered by Yahoo! and left voluntarily. His successor will be the Advanced Products Group CEO, Chad Dickerson. Ismail wrote on his personal blog that "Well, after a bunch of soul-searching, I’m leaving Yahoo. I have a couple of startups that I want to look at and I took the opportunity to take a decent package. The folks at Yahoo have been fabulous and I’ve got a very nice and very gracious goodbye. I had a total blast and it was a great year at a really great company."

For those waiting for FireEagle, Brickhouse’s current project, he mentioned that he’d help the team left behind as needed, so there should be no reason to worry that the product will have to suffer.

Interestingly enough, Ismail and Horowitz were closely connected, as Salim answered directly to Brad in company ranking, so seeing them go together leaves a big hierarchical void. Whoever will want to fill their shoes is really in for it.

MORE RELATED ARTICLES: Jerry Yang Explains Microsoft Turndown Tech Companies: Yahoo! Employees Looking Nice This Season Decision Day for Yahoo! – Microsoft or Google? Yahoo!’s Yang’s Second Letter to His Soldiers Google to Yahoo!’s Rescue in Microsoft Deal Yahoo!’s First Comments on Microsoft Bid The End of Yahoo Is Nigh!