The parent of Britain’s Daily Mail said on Wednesday it had not submitted a bid to buy Yahoo’s core Internet business, but was in talks with potential suitors of the American company.
Yahoo’s advisers are working through offers to put together a short list, Reuters reporting on Tuesday, citing sources.
Verizon Communications Inc was set to advance to the second stage of bidding and private-equity firms Apax Partners, TPG Capital, Bain Capital, Apollo Global Management, and Warburg Pincus had also submitted first-round bids, the sources said.
Read More: Don’t Believe Everything You Read on the Yahoo Sale
Yahoo has sped up the process to sell its media, email, and other web businesses, under pressure from activist shareholder Starboard Value and others.
Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer on Tuesday said she was focused on the sale and was meeting with investors and potential bidders, after the Internet company’s first-quarter profit and revenue came in slightly ahead of market expectations.
Shares of the company were up 3% at $37.54 in midday trading on Wednesday.
On an adjusted basis, Yahoo reported earnings of eight cents per share and revenue of $1.09 billion. These topped Wall Street’s target of seven cents earnings per share and $1.08 billion revenue, according to Thomson Reuters.
Buying Yahoo’s core assets—which include a search engine and email, news, and sports services—would boost Daily Mail and General Trust online reach and digital ad revenue from its globally popular websites and partly offset shrinking print revenue.
The Mail‘s celebrity-focused websites, DailyMail.com and MailOnline, are among the world’s most popular in the English language. Laden with snaps of Britain’s royal family and selfies of reality television stars, they attract a total of 14 million visitors a day.