Yahoo! Research Expands Globally with Centers in Spain and Chile; Dr. Ricardo Baeza-Yates Joins Yahoo! To Lead Research Efforts in Barcelona, Spain and Santiago, Chile

Yahoo! Research's Barcelona office will be run in conjunction withthe Center for Innovation Barcelona Media, a non-profit institutionwith local industry and Catalan government support, which has ties toUniversitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF) and other local universities. Thisfirst Yahoo! Research location in Europe will serve as the company'smagnet for the best European talent in key research areas. It alsoprovides Yahoo! with the capability to tap into innovative ideas andresearch from students and faculty at many of the local universitiesin Barcelona and other major cities. The center's new facility will beat the Parc Barcelona Media, the new reference point for mediaindustry research and academia in the 22@ district in downtownBarcelona.

Yahoo! Research's Santiago office will be run in conjunction withthe Center for Web Research (CWR), which was created by Baeza-Yatesand funded by the Millennium Scientific Initiative of the PlanningMinistry and hosted by the Faculty of Physical and MathematicalSciences at the University of Chile. The partnership with the CWRpresents a unique opportunity for top level researchers to join in acommon project and collaborate on new and innovative ideas withfaculty and students. This unit will join other advanced researchcenters already present at the University, becoming part of a veryattractive and diverse setting for innovation in Chile.

"With the recent hires of search industry experts including AndreiBroder and now Ricardo, Yahoo! continues to expand its growing benchof world-class technical talent and scientists," said PrabhakarRaghavan, head of Yahoo! Research. "This is an exciting opportunityfor Yahoo! Research to draw on the talent and knowledge across Europeand Latin America and strengthen our collaboration with universitiesthat lead in research and development."

Baeza-Yates, a former Catalonian Institution for Research andAdvanced Studies (ICREA) researcher and Professor at UPF, will play acrucial role in helping to establish strong partnerships betweenBarcelona Media, CWR and Yahoo! as well as draw on the expertise ofthe vast technical talent throughout Europe and Latin America.Baeza-Yates is an expert on information retrieval and one of the topscientists in this area. He earned a Bachelor and Masters Degree inboth Computer Science and Electrical Engineering from the Universityof Chile, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University ofWaterloo in Ontario, Canada. He is also the co-author of ModernInformation Retrieval, the most used textbook on search, as well asseveral other books.

"Yahoo! provides me with the opportunity to discover and build thenew sciences of the next generation of the Internet and have an impacton more than 400 million users," said Baeza-Yates. "Our partnershipswith Barcelona Media and the Center for Web Research provide Yahoo!with the opportunity to tap into a wealth of expertise in exploringand discovering innovative techniques in various areas of Webresearch."

"The science of the Internet is still very much in its infancy andthere are very few experts in the world that have the capabilities andknow-how to move the needle forward in this area," said Dr. UsamaFayyad, Yahoo!'s chief data officer and senior vice presidentoverseeing Yahoo! Research. "We believe that the expansion of Yahoo!Research across Europe and Latin America provides us with theopportunity to tap into some of the most renowned scientists in theworld to help Yahoo enhance its content and search offerings thatreach our growing global base of more than 400 million users, theworld's largest Internet audience."

About Yahoo! Research

Yahoo! Research works on developing the world-class science thatwill deliver the next generation of businesses to the company. Yahoo!Research scientists study data-driven analysis, high-quality search,algorithms and economic models. Yahoo! manages many of the largest andrichest data repositories in the world, and researchers mine insightsfrom these giant collections, individually and collectively,maintaining the privacy of our users while setting new standards foruser value. Yahoo! Research has facilities in Silicon Valley, SouthernCalifornia, and Berkeley, Calif. as well as in New York City,Barcelona, Spain, and Santiago, Chile.

About Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is a leading global Internet brand and one of the mosttrafficked Internet destinations worldwide. Yahoo! seeks to provideonline products and services essential to users' lives, and offers afull range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connectwith Internet users around the world. Yahoo! is headquartered inSunnyvale, California.

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