James Delahunty
23 Sep 2009 19:46
John Donahoe, Chief Executive of auction-giant eBay Inc., said that despite recent lawsuits over the underlying technology used in Skype, the $1.9 billion sale of majority interest in the Internet communication service will go ahead. "This deal is going to close," Donahoe told the annual summit of Shop.org, adding that Skype will be very successful under the "right ownership structure."
Joltid Ltd, a Swedish company owned by the original creators of Skype, Joost and Kazaa, Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, sued eBay for allegedly using its software without authorization.
There had been some fears that the lawsuit could derail the $1.9 billion deal with Netscape founder Marc Andreessen's Andreessen Horowitz, Index Ventures, Silver Lake and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board.
However, Donahoe showed Reuters an e-mail sent on Wednesday morning to him by eBay Chief Financial Officer Bob Swan that said no "show stoppers" had been identified in the recent litigation. "We're marching along," Donahoe said, adding that he expected that by November, the deal will have been completed.