Google Taps Quattrone for Yahoo Advice

Google has hired controversial former dot-com banker Frank Quattrone to advise the company on its increasingly complicated role in Yahoo’s takeover drama, the New York Times reports. It’s Quattrone’s first high-visibility gig since his obstruction-of-justice conviction was overturned last year. Google CEO Eric Schmidt is a longtime associate of Quattrone’s.

Google is thought to be part of a three-way alliance with AOL designed to prevent Yahoo from falling into Microsoft’s clutches. But anti-trust rules make Google’s involvement a legal minefield. Still, Yahoo and Google announced an advertising deal Wednesday that Yahoo thinks could raise its value. (More Google stories.)