eBay Announces Skype Sale

[longen]

Skype is expected to be sold to a group of private investors, including Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen and private equity firms.

[news.bbc.co.uk ]

[sem4u]

Looks like eBay are going to lose >$600M on the price they paid for it. I always thought that it was quite a strange acquisition.

[brotherhood of LAN]

They're still going to hold a majority stake, and have made a tiny profit, though likely a loss after costs and inflation

The deal values Skype at $2.75bn. EBay bought Skype for $2.6bn in 2005.

[Hugene]

I also read that the founders of Skype are currently in a legal battle with eBay over licensing of the core peer-to-peer communication technology on which Skype runs. That's after they got close to 1 B $ of package after leaving Skype. That's 2 tough business men.

[np2003]

I remember they tried integrating Skype with ebay listings, but that never took off. They should of integrated Paypal with Skype and innovated phone payments.

[rj87uk]

Just wondering here but what has been the biggest business sale ever? I tried to google it but couldn't find any lists. I think it would be interesting to see...

[Shaddows]

How about the definately-not-nationalisation of the banks?

Or, for the purist, simply bank mergers from last year?

Otherwise, you probably will strugle for public records, as it will have involved Hedge Funds and Private Equity from the cheap debt era.

[sem4u]

The Vodafone - Mannesmann deal was one of the biggest - a £112bn ($183bn) all-share deal to take over the German company.

[jaiganeshv]

"The deal values Skype at $2.75bn. EBay bought Skype for $2.6bn in 2005."

not such a good sale i guess..