Skype founders want to buy back company from eBay

It looks like a serious bid to buy Skype from eBay is coming to the table from co-founders Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis. The duo have reportedly talked up several private equity firms to put together a multi-billion dollar offer for Skype.

Reports say eBay wants at least the $1.7 billion current book value of Skype, while Zennstrom and Friis are trying to raise a billion in private cash with eBay possibly putting a seller’s note together for another $1 billion. Given Skype had revenues of $145 million in Q4 2008, setting up a financing instrument for the purchase of a company expected to generate more than $500 million in 2009 shouldn’t be that tough.

Skype was originally sold to eBay in 2005 for $2.6 billion and bonus payments increased the final price to $3.1 billion, so both Zennstrom and Friits are also likely good for a large chunk of cash on a repurchase effort.

Since buying Skype, eBay has been confused as to what to do with the company, ‘fessing up that the communications company hasn’t blended well with its core competencies of e-commerce and payments businesses.

Other buyers for Skype may be scared off/locked out of discussions due to low-key intellectual property discussion between eBay and Skype founders. In a recent regulatory filing, Joltid, which – surprise — was founded by Zennstrom and Friis – has terminated eBay’s license to Joltid’s peer-to-peer technology at the heart of Skype. The lawsuit is currently in a British court and also begs the question as to why eBay didn’t get exclusive rights to Skype’s peer-to-peer technology in the first place when it shelled out the original $2.6 billion.

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eBay Testing ‘eBay Bucks’ Rewards Program

Shopping on eBay just got a bit more rewarding, at least for some users of the online auctioneer’s site.

On Wednesday, eBay Inc. launched a "beta" test version of eBay Bucks, a program that lets participants earn a 2 percent reward on certain items they buy through the site and pay for using eBay’s online payment service, PayPal. Rewards come quarterly as gift certificates, which can be used to buy other items through eBay within 30 days.

Unlike many other "beta" tests, this one is open by invitation only; eBay is randomly selecting buyers to enroll. Kurt Apen, head of eBay’s loyalty marketing team, said the company will likely expand the program to everyone over the next several months.

The arrival of eBay Bucks marks the company’s latest customer-retention move — something the company is focusing on as it works to improve its online marketplace, at a time when consumers also have cut back on spending because of the dismal economy.

Other efforts eBay has undertaken include distributing coupons to users and offering discounts on referrals from Microsoft Corp.’s Live Search site.

Program participants will be able to earn up to $200 in eBay Bucks per item purchased on eBay and up to $500 per quarter. Because the reward rate is 2 percent, a $100 cell phone would earn $2 eBay Bucks, translating to $2 in gift certificates at the end of the quarter.

Apen said eBay Bucks users will be able to collect rewards on most types of items sold on the site, but real estate and many items sold through eBay Motors will be ineligible.

EBay, based in San Jose, Calif., initially tested eBay Bucks as a smaller pilot program last year. Changes since then include making it easier for users to redeem their rewards and allowing them to spread them out over various transactions….

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eBay Outlines Three-Year Revival Plan

With few exceptions, tech companies that get tagged with the dinosaur label have a hard time shaking it. Executives at eBay are making a concerted effort to keep their company off the list.

In Mar. 11 presentations for Wall Street analysts at the company’s San Jose [Calif.] headquarters, eBay executives detailed plans to increase revenue in the coming years. “This business has continued to fall short of our expectations and customers’ expectations,” said eBay CEO John Donahoe, the former Bain & Co. consultant who took over the top job from Meg Whitman last year. “That’s not acceptable. The eBay you knew is not the eBay of today or the eBay of the future.”

To back up the talk, Donahoe and others spelled out a laundry list of internal changes and specific plans both to improve the auction site and increasingly to focus on other businesses. The overall goal: to create a one-stop shop where customers can make purchases in a wide variety of ways — from bidding in auctions to clicking on ads, scanning classifieds, or making outright purchases. And he promised the site would be easier to use, offer even better deals, and provide a more satisfying experience. “The ‘buyer beware’ experience has run its course,” Donahoe said.

Some investors are giving eBay the benefit of the doubt. The company’s shares rose 4.8 percent, to 11.63, on Mar. 11. “EBay did a respectable job of trying to reposition investors’ view onto components of their business that have the most long-term growth,” says Stifel Nicolaus analyst Scott Devitt. Still, the company faces long-term challenges, Devitt says.

Slow to Adapt in the Past

Adding to the credibility was some surprising frankness about the mistakes of the past. Time and again, executives admitted what most investors had long known — that the company spent years sitting on…

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