Yahoo! may launch new homepage today: report

Internet major Yahoo! may launch its new homepage today, months earlier than planned, says a media report.

Attributing to people close to the matter The Wall Street Journal said, Yahoo! is expected to launch its new homepage today, months earlier than previously planned.

The report said that Yahoo!'s overhaul of its flagship site, originally scheduled for this fall, has been one of its biggest undertakings over the past year.

The project, known internally as "Metro", was kicked off under Yahoo!'s former chief executive Jerry Yang, as a way to let users customise the site with links to other internet services with which it has been continually competing for users' attention, it added.

"The biggest change in the new design is a left-hand menu users can customise with links to dozens of potential third-party software developers may seek to build, such as micro-blogging service Twitter, for example, and Google Inc's Gmail," the report said quoting people familiar with the matter.

Further it said that Yahoo! would pre-populate the menu with some applications and recommend other ones users should add based on their browsing behavior.

News and headlines still run down the middle of the site, which has a slightly cleaner look than the current homepage, they added.

The new design is expected to be available as an option for users when they go to Yahoo.Com, the daily said.

Yahoo! has been testing several versions of the new page for months, but last month said that it would not be completed until this fall. The company was planning on unveiling it as part of a broader rebranding in late September or October, the report said.

It noted that revamping the site has been a major priority for Bartz since she joined the company as the CEO, whose financial performance has significantly lagged behind competitors in recent years.

She has worked quickly to shutter smaller sites, like a video-sharing service, while promising to focus more resources on Yahoo!'s biggest revenue and traffic drivers, such as the homepage and its mail service, the report added.