Rumors abound that Google is looking to purchase Skype
This is firmly in the Land of Rumors for now, but word has started circulating that Google may be sniffing around Skype.
Jemima Kiss, of pda:the digital content blog, is reporting that rumors around London are that Google is talking with eBay about purchasing Skype from them. The world’s largest auction service purchased the Internet telephony company in October 2005 for $2.6 billion, a price that even one of the company founders thought was too much.
There have been many rumors that eBay is unhappy with the performance of the VoIP system, and is unsure what to do with the company. The original idea was to integrate Skype fully into eBay so that buyers could communicate easily with sellers, but over two years later and that ability is still only in a handful of categories.
With the recent partnership between Skype and the UK-based mobile carrier, 3, it is obvious Skype is entering the mobile phone market. Coincidentally, Google recently announced their mobile OS, Android, and they are expected to bid in the FCC’s upcoming auction for the 700MHz band. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that Skype may be a better fit for Google with their other recent projects then it ever was for an auction company.
Could we be seeing the early hints of the birth of a nationwide mobile VoIP solution where one could use Skype anytime, anywhere?
We’ll be keeping a very watchful eye on this.
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