eBay devalues Skype; Zennstrom steps down as CEO

Stuart Corner
Tuesday, 02 October 2007 06:50

IT Industry - Deals

Ovum for one was unconvinced. It commented at the time: "It's questionable whether most eBay sellers want direct real-time communication with buyers. Merchants are probably too busy, and individuals will find it hard to weed-out timewasters pestering them for trivial information. E-mail surely works very well in those situations." Certainly eBay has not been prominent in promoting synergies with the Skype business. However it is still growing strongly.

eBay reported in its Q2 results last month that Skype net revenues totalled a record $US90 million in Q2-07, a growth rate of 103 percent over the $US44 million reported in Q2-06. Skype had 220 million registered user accounts at the end of Q2-07, representing a 94 percent increase from the 113 million registered user accounts at the end of Q2-06.

Skype generated only $US7 million in revenues in 2004, and ebay forecast that it would generate more than $US200 million in 2006.