With the entry of the biggest portal in the world with a presence in 15 countries, including China, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore, leading India-specific portals such as Rediff.com and Indiatimes.com will now have eyeball to eyeball competition.

The launch, to be presided over by key Yahoo! Singapore executive David Mickler is important as Yahoo's entry into India has generated a lot of interest in the Internet circles.

Following its worldwide model of being a aggregating umbrella, the company has already essayed a clutch of tie-ups which will be unveiled at a press conference called by Yahoo! in Mumbai.

Some of these include portals like indiainfo.com, itspace.com, sharekhan.com, archies.com and dgreetings.com. In addition, it has tied up with go4i.com and Hindustan Times from north India and The Hindu and the New Indian Express from the south for the news content.

While the tie-ups are for content and based on joint-promotion, it is believed Yahoo! will not be buying content from these portals. Yahoo has already put together exhaustive content on and about India through its tie-ups which can be accessed through asia.yahoo.com. Globally, Yahoo! outsources content from local sites and puts it on its Website.

Yahoo! is also expected to name its executive team on Thursday. Speculation has been rife that Yahoo! has chosen Indya.com chief executive Sunil Lulla to head the India operations, but it has not been confirmed. The team has at the helm two vice-presidents, including the former indianexpress.com head Pradipto Basu.

Yahoo! India has hired about 300 employees within last two months. Its operations will be based in Mumbai and Bangalore.