After a long standing legal battle between the online auction giant, eBay and the internet telephony company, Skype has finally led to the salvation of Skype, as eBay has sold out a major share of telephony company, but still retains 30% stake in Skype. It is one of the most biggest and most successful web telephonic company, that provides its users with free calling between Skype and also provides

Skype has been sold a group of investors, after eBay managed to complete a successful assessment of Skype’s value that finally reached to $2.75 billion. The group on investors that, bought Skype includes Andreessen Horowitz, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), Joltid Limited and the brains behind Skype, Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis. Ebay had purchased Skype on the year 2005.

However, the founders of Skype had filed a lawsuit against eBay earlier this year, that almost brought the end of the world’s most preferred web phone company. In the lawsuit, the founders of Skype had stated that, the technology for Skype was their own creation and also accused eBay of violating the licensing agreement. The court case was later settled as Zennström and Friis were finally given a share of their company.

According to Josh Silverman (President, Skype),

“Great news – we’ve closed the deal with the new investors. Our journey continues: say hello to the future!”

Via Sky & Skype.

The long standing legal stand off between Skype, a leading online communications network and one of the largest online shopping websites, eBay has finally come to end with the founders of Skype being awarded a 14% stake in the company along with two seats on Skype’s board of directors. eBay retains 30% rights on Skype. The private investors, who helped Skype reach a global platform will have a 56% stake in the now divided company. The settlement also calls for an immediate drop of the lawsuit, that the Skype founders, Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis had brought upon eBay and a host of investors who had announced their intentions to buy 65% of Skype.

According to John J. Donahoe (CEO, eBay).

“Skype will be well positioned to move forward under new owners with ownership and control over its core technology. At the same time, eBay continues to retain a significant stake in Skype and will benefit from its continued growth. We look forward to closing the deal and focusing on growing our core e-commerce and payments businesses.”

However, one of the primary investors of Skype, Index Ventures, the venture capital firm that spawned the buyout offers for Skype and led to the grueling court room battle has decided to recede from the deal struck between Skype, eBay and the investors. Index Venture has stated that the deal does not match the company’s financial criteria and thus the firm has chosen to distance itself from the deal altogether.

Now that Skype is free of legal hassles, the global online communications service can finally look forward to innovate and create better ways of communications for the users. While Skype was busy tussling it out in court room arena, significant developments have taken place, that will surely compel the company to quickly get its act together and start building for the future. The emergence of Google Voice as a stark competitor in the international calling domain should be enough to get the spirit of competition back to Skype. Furthermore, the launch of new smart phones that are capable of running Skype, rather than on PCs, further gives the company a reason to innovate and grab the profits off the wireless online communication domain.

Via ZDNet.

Between November 10 and January 15, 2010, users of the airline company Virgin America may use the free Wi-Fi offered during the flight, courtesy of Google in partnership with the company. The service will be operated by Gogo Inflight Internet.

According to the IT PRO site, the Internet connection will be offered free on flights between the cities of Boston, Fort Lauderdale, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, New York, Orange County, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington.

Virgin America has offered access to the Gogo Inflight Internet in all its flights since May, charging a fee ranging from US$ 5.96 to US$12.95, according to the duration of the trip. The airline also offers power outlets near every seat. On longer trips, the company says that about 25% of passengers choose to use the Internet service connection.

Internet use during the flight, however, must follow certain rules. According to Information Week site, the terms of service of the Gogo Inflight prohibit the use of Skype as a way of organizing the use of bandwidth. According to research conducted with users of Virgin America, users support the initiative, as blocking the use of VoIP applications saves you from having a seat-mate who likes to talk.

Via: IT PRO.

The founders of Kazaa, Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, in partnership with Skype, should throw in the beginning of 2010 Rdio, service that will allow the sharing, storage and streaming of music online, based on a signatures system.

The music businesses move in a very slow way due to the subjects of copyrights. The first attempt was the creation of DRM, later the distribution of music based on publicity, and now the signature model, that seems quite functional.

Mark Piibe, boss of development of digital businesses of EMI, affirmed to The Times that the EMI was in contact with Rdio, and that there was not reluctance in doing agreements with the creators of Kazaa. “Them (Zennström and Friis) are bringing new several ideas for music distribution and reason doesn’t exist for the which we would not talk with them in a serious way”, emphasized Piibe.

Spotify, service online that there is online by one year offers to the European public free music supported by announcements and it has intentions of arriving to the United States also next year. However, the North Americans recordings are more resistant to liberate music in a free way because that already happens in sites as MySpace.

If the hunch of Zennström and Friis is right, Rdio can beat similar services, as Last.fm, Pandora and even Spotify.

Via: Mashable.

It’s bad news on AOL’s side as they have been gradually losing market share. To add to this rude fate, AOL has also fallen to the No.4 spot, which is a notch below Google’s Gmail service. According to the recent statistics revealed by ComScore show that AOL’s monthly visitors went down from 45.1 million in July 2008 to 36.4 million in July 2009, which is a 19% drop. In order to revive their fortunes and get back their popularity, AOL plans to either acquire or partner with Startups.

Brad Garlinghouse, formerly a senior Vice President at Yahoo has joint AOL as the President of Internet and Mobile Communications that includes AOL’s e-mail and instant messaging. Garlinghouse is interesting in making AIM interoperable with Facebook and Skype so that the fate of AOL could be ameliorated faster.

On the contrary, Google’s Gmail is experiencing a great traffic rate. Within July 2008 to July 2009, Gmail grew at the rate of 46%. This is a terrific growth and they might raise Windows Live Hotmail by next February should they maintain this rate. There definitely is a tough competition in the web world. It’s getting more interesting as time passes by.

Via: Gigaom\InformationWeek

According to a report published in the London Times, Asus, a Taiwanese company is soon to come up with their eReader called the ‘Eee Reader”. If the report is true, then Asus will provide two versions of their e-book, of which one will be the cheapest in the market, while the other one will also be relatively cheap. Besides the cheap price, Asus is also creating a book like e-Reader complete with hinged spine, like a printed book.

This will enable the readers to read an ebook much like the same they read a normal book. The users can use the touchscreen to turn the pages. If you wish to use the device as a laptop, then you can do so as it has one of its touchscreens that functions like a keypad. Asus will be available in full color.

It may also come with speakers, a webcam and a microphone for Skype so that you can use cheap phone calls on the internet. Asus also claims that its ebook reader will be much cleverer and more versatile than the current ones available from Sony and Amazon. According to Jerry Shen, the President of the company, their Eee Reader will be available by the end of this year.

Via: BestTabletReview\TimesOnline

For all you Skype fans, here is interesting news about the famous online telephony service. According to a team of reporters from the New York Times, Skype will soon be sold by eBay to a group of private investors. This includes Netscape founder Marc Andreessen’s new Venture Capital group. With recession going on at high speed, this is the fate that most companies are facing these days. Until recently, it was rumored that Skype’s founders were interested in buying the company themselves but due to financial constraints they couldn’t do so.

It is sad that such a cool site like Skype, which has nearly twice as many users as Facebook is going to be sold. Skype generates approximately $600 million annually. We as Skype user cannot do anything but to wait and watch what kind of new changes will come up along with the acquisition. I only hope that the new owners either retain the old facilities or ameliorate them.

Until proper restructure happens, this will create a lot of anxieties amongst the users of Skype. I hope this doesn’t stop the Skype users from using the site in future. At least I will not stop.

Via: ReadWriteWeb

The auctions online site eBay prepares the sale of Skype, software that has about 400 million users in the world that allows the communication peer-to-peer in VoIP system (Voice over Internet Protocol), according to with information published today by The New Times.

According to the newspaper, that mentions two sources that know about that, the announcement of the sale will still be made on this Tuesday. The new owners of Skype will be private investment funds, including Andreessen Horowitz, a new venture capital firm headed by the co-founder of Netscape Marc Andressen, and initial investors of Skype. The Index Britons Ventures and Silver Lake Partners can also participate in the operation.

In agreement with New Times, the eBay asks for US$ 2 billion on average for Skype that has annual incomes of US$ 600 million. The service was bought by the eBay in 2005 for US$ 3,1 billion, with the promise of integrating to the platforms of retail of the auctions site, something that never happened.

NYT says although the eBay tried to negotiate Skype with Google, but the company stood back for believing that the acquisition could complicate other areas of performance of the company.

The newspaper increased that the value of the agreement, that it should still be announced on this Tuesday, it was not revealed up to now. The spokesperson of the eBay, Alan Marks, didn’t comment on the subject.

In May, the president-executive of the online auctions site, John Donahoe, affirmed that a value of US$ 2 billion would be low for Skype.

Via: NYT.

In a recent report, some of the biggest names in Russian business environment have expressed their concerns over the growing popularity of Skype and other internet telephony services, that are operating in Russia. According to the report, these services have been deemed as dangerous to the Russian economy and a threat to the nation’s security. The report has been generated by an independent body, comprised of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s political party and various high level lobbyists, researching on the dangers posed by Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services.

According to many concerned lobbyists,

“Without government restrictions, IP telephony causes certain concerns about security. Most of the service operators working in Russia, such as Skype and Icq, are foreign. It is therefore necessary to protect the native companies in this sector and so forth.”

The Russian business groups are concerned that, foreign services like Skype and others, will eventually sidetrack the domestic telecom enterprises in Russia and would cause a landslide in domestic profits. As per a study conducted by Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, it has been established that almost 40% of all calls made in Russia would be taken over by Skype and other VoIP telephony services.

According to Valery Ermakov (Deputy Head, MegaFon, Russia),

“MegaFon is interested in this market. We’re interested in providing analogous services. We don’t support limiting competition, but we want the market to be civilized.”

Via Tech2.

The portal Joost, pioneered in the showing of films and TV on the Internet, you will leave its system for the consumer and will cut jobs – in addition to losing its CEO, Mike Volpi.

The company said Tuesday that will change its strategy to serve as a platform for video to outlets media such as TV companies, cable or satellite, and television networks. Therefore, the portal is far from idea to be primarily a site for ” common internet user.”

The Joost was launched in 2007 amid a furor much as the new challenge of the Skype founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennström, who launched the voice over IP service Skype. Rather, the executives had founded Kazaa, the file sharing service that was very popular on the internet.

But the site failed to become the largest site of serials and films, losing that position for Hulu.com, an association between News Corp., the NBC Universal and Walt Disney.

The number of spectators of the Hulu grew rapidly last year and he is now the second site most visited more seen in the U.S. (in the video category), behind YouTube, Google.

Via: Reuters.