Yahoo to be more social under CEO Yang revival plan

By Eric Auchard

LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc (YHOO.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) Chief Executive Jerry Yang on Monday highlighted his vision for reinvigorating the pioneering Web company and solidifying Yahoo's role as the essential starting point for Web users.

In the co-founder's first major speech since taking over as CEO in June, Yang told an industry conference about inroads Yahoo is making in putting Web services on mobile phones and provided a glimpse into its evolving overall strategy.

He said services would be more social, making it easier for users to update friends automatically on their Web activities.

"With Yahoo, we plan on being the most essential starting page for your life," Yang told the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the premier U.S. conference for the technology industry.

Yahoo is looking to recover its footing following years of gains by rivals including Google Inc (GOOG.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Facebook and News Corp's (NWSa.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) MySpace in attracting vast audiences for Web search, advertising and social networking. Yahoo shares are near a four-year low, and ended flat on Monday at $23.18.

Yahoo aims to grow beyond a base of several hundred million users that already make Yahoo.com their online starting point.

Yang demonstrated publicly for the first time a prototype of a new version of Yahoo Mail, the most widely used consumer e-mail service in the world, with more than 250 million users.

He showed how Yahoo Mail can become "a smarter inbox" and more like a social network that sends updates of a user's online activities to friends in their Yahoo Mail address book.