It took just around six weeks for the world to prove to me that the madness is here to stay… Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock the past 24 hrs, you would know what I am referring to !! The insane $4Billion being paid to Skype by eBay ($2.6b now + remaining based on growth nos, which Skype is bound to hit pretty much on target)!! While the amount sure is causing a lot of consternation all around, there are a LOT more funny facts sorrounding this acquisition…Take for instance, the bidder, eBay!! Having been a garage startup, one would expect eBay to have shown a bit more prudence in juggling with the numbers..No, I am not any i-banker who sits and sells companies for a living. But I fail to see any huge synergies between eBay and Skype, except for allowing “free” calls between eBay users!! And like The Register so very rightly pointed out, Meg Whitman could have surely done better than suggesting selling the account details to spamsters !!! And I certainly don’t see it contributing to the synergy than paypal did (poor fellahs were only found worth $1.5B last year !!) Most analysts now seem to draw solace from the fact that eBay would want to tap into the new advertising streams that it can pull in through Skype!! And yea, eBay also hopes this to be a foot in the door for markets such as India !! Could somebody tell them the absymal tele-density/internet penetration and even lower broadband availability stats !! Baah, whoz bothered with them…The stock markets are booming and so is the perception that India Rocks bigtime now !!! If eBay can really pull this off without getting pulled down with this albatross around their neck, it is gonna be a story like no other, and I sure am looking forward to watching this from the sidelines…
Hmmm…Insane amounts of money, startups being snapped, and more importantly, an over-riding faith in ad revenues…Need more proof???
ps: Came across this blog during some reading up on Skype..Do check it out…
4 Responses to “Madness….Confirmed !!!”
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September 14th, 2005 at 10:09 pm
What ad revenues are you talking about ? I think you are under a different rock
September 15th, 2005 at 2:48 pm
LOL….Almost there..Almost
March 31st, 2006 at 12:01 am
[...] Hmm..Is it just me or is VoIP back bigtime now, albeit as a money spinner. The last time I blogged about Skype, things were at a high for that market. Last few days, there has been quite some noise from a coupla players. One’s a new startup called Jajah and the other’s good ‘ol grand-daddy of ‘em internet portals, Lycos. Interestingly, both follow a new kind of value addition. While Jajah, lets you use your regular landlines to call other countries, Lycos goes a step further and gives you a local US number that is tied to your user account on the software. I have tried out Lycos and so far, it sure does seem to work without a glitch. Jajah- blame the Indian populace. We’ve already used all the trial minutes that they have allocated for this country Anyways. I sure thought it was interesting to see varying thoughts coming into play in this market and how marketers wanna survive on under 1cent calls !! [...]
April 27th, 2006 at 10:40 am
[...] Yep. Thats what it looks like to me atleast. Since ebay purchased it for an astronomical sum, concerns have been expressed at how ebay is likely to look towards monetizing skype and creating revenue streams. Yesterday’s news saw Skype’s proposal to come up with ringtones from various music publishers for its online VoIP service. Yea, sure looks a different revenue stream, but I would like to look at it as the first signs of shaky legs ! Goes to show how millions of people making calls at a pittance ain’t exactly the panacea for profitability, there’s more than meets the eye ! And giving further substance to these signs is a report suggesting that ebay is in talks with Y! and Microsoft in order to identify a suitable ally to combat Google ! Sure is a jittery business environment for these companies where their thrust is in identifying how to survive tomorrow rather than how to make money today [...]