Corporate raider, Carl Icahn has backed off with his proxy battle with Yahoo and has accepted a minority stake on the company's board of directors. The board will lose Activision/Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick, who has decided to move on, but Icahn will get two other seats at the table, which basically means Carl Miller and someone else will join Icahn, expanding the board to 11 members.

I am not sure who wins with this 'compromise' outcome, Jerry Yang and his executives remain in control of Yahoo, but if they were really confident in beating Icahn they could have let the shareholder's decide in the upcoming annual shareholder's meeting. Icahn doesn't exactly effect the change he was looking for either, he still has to sit down with Jerry at the head of the table, still in charge, and essentially all he can do now is complain.

"I am happy that the board has agreed in the settlement agreement that any meaningful transaction, including the strategy in dealing with that transaction, will be fully discussed with the entire board before any final decision is made," Icahn said in the statement.

Given that Icahn's grandiose take-over plans have disintegrated over recent weeks it seems that he was prepared to accept the crumbs on offer. Maybe this move is for the best, as now they can stop hurling insults at each other and they can get down to business. With Miller aboard this is now a possibility. Still, I wouldn't be surprised if Ballmer is watching with great interest and could still be lurking in the wings.

Yahoo shares fell 20 cents, or nearly 1 percent, to $22.25 in pre-market trading. I'm sure Yahoo shareholder's don't need reminding of the fact that their stock is trading far below Microsoft's last offer price of $33 per share, a bid that was withdrawn in May.