Yahoo!Xtra
| Company type | Joint venture |
|---|---|
| Industry | Internet services |
| Founded | 2006 |
| Founder | Telecom New Zealand, Yahoo!7 |
| Defunct | 2011 |
| Fate | Telecom New Zealand sold its share to Yahoo!7; rebranded as Yahoo! New Zealand |
| Headquarters | Auckland , New Zealand |
Area served | New Zealand |
| Owner | Yahoo!7 (51%), Telecom New Zealand (49%) until 2011 |
Yahoo!Xtra represented a collaborative venture in New Zealand between Yahoo!7 and Telecom New Zealand (currently known as Spark), operating a web portal under the same designation. Yahoo!7 owned a majority 51% share, while Telecom NZ held 49%. Given that Yahoo!7 itself was equally owned by two parties, Yahoo! effectively possessed a 25.5% interest in Yahoo!Xtra. In April 2011, Telecom divested its portion to Yahoo!7, leading to the portal’s rebranding as Yahoo! New Zealand.
XtraMSN
Telecom introduced the ISP Xtra in 1996, which by 2008 had become the largest internet service provider in New Zealand. In 2001, a partnership between Telecom and MSN resulted in the launch of the XtraMSN portal. By 2006, this platform was delivering more than 100 million page views each month and attracted over 3 million unique visitors monthly, with site traffic increasing by 45% during its final two years.
Transition to Yahoo
In December 2006, Telecom entered into a joint venture with Australia's Yahoo!7—an entity jointly owned by the Seven Network and Yahoo!—to establish Yahoo!Xtra. The existing Telecom-Microsoft portal ceased operations on 1 March 2007, redirecting users to either YahooXtra.co.nz or Msn.co.nz.
Responsibility for content management was assigned to Yahoo!, which maintained an Auckland office overseeing Sales, Marketing, Advertising Operations, Production, and Finance functions. The Editorial division was tasked with producing local news, sports, and entertainment content.
After Telecom’s withdrawal in 2011, employees from Yahoo!Xtra were absorbed into Yahoo! New Zealand. Meanwhile, Yahoo!7 continued providing support services for Telecom's broadband clientele.
Xtra Mail
Following Telecom’s sale of its interest in Yahoo!Xtra, Yahoo! retained management of Telecom’s email platform. In early 2013, the service encountered significant criticism due to a large-scale spam and phishing incident—the most extensive cyberattack recorded in New Zealand at that time. To mitigate risks and protect users, Telecom implemented automatic password resets for thousands of accounts. Despite the adverse publicity, Telecom opted to continue its partnership with Yahoo! as its email provider in April 2013, emphasizing ongoing service obligations.
Between September 2016 and April 2017, after rebranding as Spark New Zealand, the company transitioned Xtra Mail from Yahoo!’s infrastructure to its own domain under spark.co.nz. This move was designed to enhance user experience and service reliability. Spark collaborated with local email provider SMX to offer more secure and dependable email solutions, representing a strategic progression of Telecom’s email services.
Promotion
The launch campaign for Yahoo!Xtra, titled X meets Y, included a television advertisement featuring Regina Spektor’s track "Fidelity" as a young couple shared an intimate kiss. This promotional effort significantly elevated Spektor’s recognition within New Zealand, turning "Fidelity" into one of her most successful singles.