You can now formally call off eBay’s efforts to spin off Skype–not that many people took them seriously to begin with. The company has sold off 65 percent of its internet telephony business to a consortium of private investors for $1.9 billion. The deal puts Skype’s overall value at $2.75 billion, a bit more than the $2.6 billion eBay paid for the company in 2005.
The promise of “virtual goods”–pretend things you buy with real money in cyberspace–has lured entrepreneurs and venture capitalists for years. Same goes for mobile payments–using your iPhone instead of your Amex to buy stuff. But what if you combined the two? You’d have a market that barely exists yet is worth fighting over. At least that’s what Zong and Boku are doing.
Peter Kafka has been covering media and technology since 1997, when he joined the staff of Forbes magazine. Most recently, he has been the managing editor of the tech and media Web site, Silicon Alley Insider. Read more »
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