By Ian King
(Updates share price in second-to-last paragraph.)
Dec. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. hired Washington lobbying firm Duberstein Group Inc. earlier this year as it explored potential transactions involving Yahoo! Inc.
Duberstein, founded by Kenneth Duberstein, a former chief of staff under President Ronald Reagan, disclosed its affiliation with Alibaba?s legal representatives in a filing this month.
Alibaba, China?s largest e-commerce business, has sought to buy back a stake that Yahoo owns in the company. It stepped up efforts to make a deal after the September ouster of Yahoo Chief Executive Officer Carol Bartz, who opposed a sale. Yahoo also is considering proposals by private-equity firms seeking to buy minority stakes, people with knowledge of the talks have said.
Yahoo?s 40 percent stake in Alibaba has given it a piece of the fast-growing Chinese market, helping maintain the U.S. Internet company?s value even as it loses ground to Google Inc. and Facebook Inc. Yahoo acquired the stake in Hangzhou, China- based Alibaba for about $1 billion in 2005.
Yahoo has considered offers for a minority stake from bidders such as TPG Capital and a group led by Silver Lake, people familiar with the matter have said. Silver Lake?s bid valued Yahoo at about $16.60 a share, these people said. TPG Capital?s offer was higher, they said.
Huawei?s Example
Alibaba?s involvement in a deal may draw scrutiny from the U.S. government, especially because Yahoo handles online communications for millions of Americans.
In 2008, China?s Huawei Technologies Co. dropped a bid for Marlborough, Massachusetts-based computer-equipment maker 3Com Corp. after the U.S. government began investigating whether a deal would give China access to technology used by the Defense Department.
John Spelich, an Alibaba spokesman, declined to comment, as did Dana Lengkeek, a spokeswoman for Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo. The Duberstein Group said it doesn?t comment on its clients.
Yahoo shares rose 2.2 percent to $16.13 at the close in New York. The stock has declined 3 percent this year.
Alibaba hiring Duberstein was previously reported by Reuters.
--With assistance from Kristin Jensen in Washington. Editors: Nick Turner, John Lear
To contact the reporter on this story: Ian King in San Francisco at ianking@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net
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