Chinese Version2018-01-22
Today, while talking to my nephew, a born-the-90s, about well-known software products in Europe, he said: “Skype was developed by Europeans, but it was acquired by Microsoft.”
This opened my memory: before Microsoft acquired Skype, eBay acquired Skype in 2005, when eBay was not very big and the employees seemed to have a say in the company’s decisions.
In 2005, eBay purchased Skype’s products for $2.6 billion, but did not acquire Skype’s core technology. Skype’s core technology is still a patent owned by Skype’s founders.
Shortly after the acquisition of Skype, eBay renovated an independent two-story house on the side of Hamilton, where eBay’s headquarters is located. While walking in the campus during lunch time, I often wondered who will come to stay in this very special office. Later, I heard it became the office of the Skype devision. This story give a glimpse of the privileges enjoyed by Skype employees at that time and eBay’s high expectations for the Skype devision.
After eBay acquired Skype, the combination of the eBay market, the PayPal payment system and the Skype communication network provided new business opportunities for eBay; In order to organically integrate the three parts, eBay added a New Trinity (three in one) unit under a new VP.
However, the response of eBay’s acquisition of Skype among eBay employees was not good. I remember that at several employee conferences in 2006, someone questioned John D. our CEO like: “Skype is almost unprofitable. Why did the company spend such big money on acquisition?”, “How did the company conduct the pre-acquisition evaluation?”, etc. These questions also made me feel that the acquisition of Skype was a bad investment. Skype was acquired by Microsoft from eBay for $8.5 billion in 2011, which seemed eBay’s acquisition of Skype for $2.6 billion in 2005 a worthwhile investment.
The Trinity unit died prematurely, Skype was acquired by Microsoft in 2011, and Paypal separated from eBay into an independent company in 2015. The VP of Trinity founded a payment company in 2011. I heard his company was successfully acquired by Walmart.
The former structure of combining the eBay market, the PayPal payment system, and the Skype communication network is just like a drop of rain in the four seasons of a rapidly expanding large company’s history. But in the hearts of their employees who had personally experienced this drizzle, it always held some personal emotional, interesting and knowledgeable stories.
I told my nephew with a laugh: “in 2006, I was convinced that eBay’s acquisition of Skype was an unwise investment, and I was very upset about it.”
My nephew replied: “eBay’s acquisition of Skype was a long-term investment.”
I sighed: “Yes, it’s hard for conscientious bottom employees to have a vision of long-term investment. My resentment was just an unwarranted worry. ”
After listening to the stories of eBay and Skype, my daughter commented: “I still remember when we were in junior high school, there was a dispute between our classmates to support Google video or YouTube. Later, Google Video fell out of favor among users, and Google bought YouTube. ”
A drizzle in the history of rapidly expanding large companies always left some personal emotional, interesting and knowledgeable stories in the hearts of people who had experienced this drizzle in person.
Snap of History
User facing Youtube grew much faster than backend Skype did.
In 2003， Skype was founded by Niklas Zennström, from Sweden, and Janus Friis, from Denmark.
On 09-12-2005, eBay Inc. agreed to acquire Skype Technologies SA for approximately $2.5 billion。
On 05-10－2011, Microsoft Corporation acquired Skype for $8.5 billion.
In 02-2005 YouTube was launched by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim.
In 10-2006, YouTube was bought by Google for $1.65 billion.
