SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Yahoo Inc. appears to have settled on Silicon Valley veteran Carol Bartz as its new chief executive, ushering in a no-nonsense leader known for developing a clear focus — something that has eluded the struggling Internet company during a three-year slump.

The decision, reported yesterday by The Wall Street Journal, would end Yahoo's two-month search to replace co-founder Jerry Yang, who surrendered the CEO reins after potentially lucrative deals with rivals Microsoft Corp. and Google Inc. both collapsed.

Yahoo spokesman Brad Williams declined to comment on the Journal's report, which cited unnamed people familiar with the situation.

The Sunnyvale, California-based company would be luring Bartz, 60, from Autodesk Inc., which specialises in making design software for architects and engineers. Bartz was the San Rafael, California-based company's CEO from 1992 until 2006, when she stepped aside to become executive chairman.

Bartz's appointment could set the stage for Microsoft to renew its efforts to buy Yahoo's Internet search operations as a way of mounting a more serious threat to Google, the market leader. Microsoft had been reluctant to deal with Yang because he rebuffed several previous overtures, including a $47.5 billion offer to buy Yahoo in its entirety last May.

Microsoft subsequently withdrew that bid, valued at $33 per share, and now Yahoo's stock price hovers around $12. Yang had hoped to placate shareholders by using Google's superior technology to sell some of the ads alongside Yahoo's search results, but that idea unravelled in November after federal antitrust regulators threatened to block the deal.

Investors didn't seem convinced Yahoo would be better off with Bartz. Yahoo shares fell 27 cents to $11.95 in yesterday afternoon's trading.

Bartz's track record indicates she likely would act quickly to build upon Yahoo's strengths while doing her best to shed the weaknesses.

"She is able to see the essence of things because she doesn't spend a lot of time worrying about how people are going to feel," said Nilofer Merchant, a former Autodesk manager who is now CEO of technology consultant Rubicon. "She is driven by doing the best thing for the business."

Under Bartz's leadership, Autodesk's annual revenue has ballooned from $285 million to $2.2 billion. Perhaps more importantly to Yahoo's long-suffering shareholders, Autodesk's stock price rose by an annual average of nearly 20 percent during Bartz's stint as CEO, beating the 10.6 percent annual average for the Standard & Poor's 500 index.

Bartz had established her management chops before joining Autodesk. She spent nine years at Sun Microsystems Inc., where she eventually became the No. 2 executive behind the server maker's then-CEO, Scott McNealy.

Despite Bartz's resume, she will likely face questions about whether she is a good fit at Yahoo because she lacks any background in advertising — the primary source of Yahoo's income. Yahoo also is far larger than Autodesk, with annual revenue of more than $7 billion and roughly 13,000 employees, nearly twice the size of Autodesk's work force. As one of the first women to run a technology company, Bartz is used to being underestimated. Even after she had been Autodesk's CEO for years, some of her male counterparts occasionally mistook her for an administrative assistant while she was attending industry conferences.