eBay to spin off Skype with IPO in 2010

Filed under: News , VoIP It looks like Skype will become its own company again next year. But eBay isn’t looking to sell Skype back to founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, despite recent reports that they were hoping to buy the company again. Instead, eBay put out a press release today announcing that it would separate Skype from eBay and sell it through an IPO (initial public offering) in the first half of 2010. In the release, eBay CEO John Donahoe admits something that most of us have known since eBay first purchsed Skype for around $3 billion: “Skyper has limited synergies with

eBay and PayPal.” By separating Skype from eBay and running it as its own publicly traded company, Skype can do what’s best for a VoIP company and not have to worry about being attached to an online auction house. Skype generated $551 million in revenue in 2008, and had 405 million registered users. [via Techmeme ] eBay to spin off Skype with IPO in 2010 originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 14 Apr 2009 17:14:00 EST. Gadgets. A Gadget Zone | A Gadget Zone | A Gadget Zone | A Gadget Zone

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eBay to spin off Skype with IPO in 2010