The acquisition of Yahoo! by Microsoft is inevitable, says Scott Kessler, the authoritative tech equity analyst at Standard & Poor’s, in this interview published this morning on the WSJ.com.  He says that only Microsoft has the resources to close the deal, despite published reports about possible a tie-up with Time Warner.

Interviewing Kessler is M&A lead beat reporter Dennis Berman who asks Kessler if the prospective Microsoft/Yahoo! deal is like "two drunks holding each other up."  Meaning they both have faltered in the online space.  Kessler has some interesting thoughts on the potential merger, branding of the names and related topics.  Great interview.

This much discussed deal is turning into quite a reporting bonanza for Berman and his counterpart Andrew Ross Sorkin at The New York Times.  (The two seem to battling for the spotlight quite intensely these days.)

How cool is it that we can cut and paste the code for the this interview and put it right here on the purple channel!

— Andy Plesser