Oct 14,2011
Today Skype has announced on its Blog that the deal with Microsoft has formally closed, and Skype is now a division of Microsoft.
Skype was founded in 2003 by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis; it was acquired by eBay in 2005, but eBay couldn’t find a way to integrate it into its business and subsequently sold it to an investment group led by Silver Lake in 2009.
The $8.5 billion deal with Microsoft is a very profitable exit for that group of investors, which includes Index Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz and the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) Investment Board — they paid $2.75 billion for Skype.
As for the future of Skype and the challenges Microsoft faces, the first and foremost will be the fact that Skype is not yet profitable.
Skype was founded in 2003 by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis; it was acquired by eBay in 2005, but eBay couldn’t find a way to integrate it into its business and subsequently sold it to an investment group led by Silver Lake in 2009.
The $8.5 billion deal with Microsoft is a very profitable exit for that group of investors, which includes Index Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz and the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) Investment Board — they paid $2.75 billion for Skype.
As for the future of Skype and the challenges Microsoft faces, the first and foremost will be the fact that Skype is not yet profitable.
