Microsoft in Talks To Acquire Ebay

thatedeguy writes "The NY Post is reporting that Microsoft and Ebay are in talks for the online auction house to join the Microsoft family." That said, the talks aren't going that well at the moment. From the article: " Sources indicate that the talks, while still active, have cooled somewhat in the last two weeks as executives considered antitrust issues. It is unclear what the full impact of yesterday's advertising and search alliance between Yahoo! and eBay will be for talks between MSN and eBay. One source close to the matter suggested the Yahoo-eBay tie-up would not stop Microsoft from pursuing the online auctioneer."

Comments

mmmm monopolies...

[abigsmurf]

With MS already in trouble over abuse of market share, I can't see any anti-monopoly commission approving a buyout of this size.

Re:mmmm monopolies...

[DrSkwid]

In what way is that anything like with bundling IE/Media Player in Windows while having a "monopoly" position in the OS market ?

Does Google have a monopoly in ANY sphere ?

Re:mmmm monopolies...

[DrSkwid]

eBay is not an auction site, it's an auction-style site =)

An auction has a legal definition, which eBay doesn't meet - that is : goods have to be available for physical visual inspection for at least 24 hours prior to auction time.

Auctions were used to return or disperse recovered stolen property (or just stolen). Once offered at auction, stolen property is not automatically returned to its owner should it be proven stolen later, unlike other stolen property.

This is why eBay describes itself as : "eBay, the world's largest online marketplace!"

and ... "Experience the thrill of placing the winning bid on an auction-style item"

Re:mmmm monopolies...

[TheRaven64]

First of all, Google did not sue Microsoft over the matter you suggest. They publicly criticised them for it, but that was it. Second, Google are not (ab)using a monopoly in one area to try to gain a monopoly in another.

Microsoft have a de facto monopoly in the operating systems market. If Microsoft bindles a 'free'[1] web browser with their operating system, then they make it much harder for other browsers to compete. This is anti-competitive behaviour. It would have been acceptable for them to produce a web browser as a free download (since Netscape already offered a browser free for non-commercial use) and even for OEMs to bundle Microsoft's browser with their computers. It was not acceptable for Microsoft to penalise OEMs who bundled Netscape's browser.

Likewise, Microsoft now have a de facto monopoly in the web browser market. If they make their search engine the default in their browser, bundled with their OS, then they are using their monopoly position in two markets to attempt to gain a monopoly in a third. This is anti-competitive behaviour and should be criticised. Sure, the user can change it, in the same way that they can change the default browser. The point is that it is much easier for them not to, and the ability to do this is only available for the monopolist, not other members of the market.

Google's page defaults to Google's services, and that's fine. Why? Because Google (as of November 2005 - I can't find any more recent statistics) has 46.3% of the search engine market. While this is more than any of their competitors, it is nothing like a monopoly. If they had 80% or so, then it might be seen as anticompetitive behaviour to encourage Google users to use gmail and Google Talk. Well, except for the fact that these both use open standards and so anyone can interoperate with them.

[1] Free is quoted here since the cost is included in the OS, rather than it being truly zero-cost.

Obligatory Joke

[Anonymous Coward]

Bidding for Ebay starts at $8 billion, but you can Buy It Now for $12.5 billion.

Re:Obligatory Joke

[CheeseTroll]

They'll make up the difference with an astronomical shipping price.

Oh, wonderful.

[SEE]

Microsoft, running eBay, PayPal, and Skype.

Reminds me of HotMail

[Anonymous Coward]

MS will spend YEARS trying to dump the *nix servers out of Ebay ;-)

Investors would freak

[crummyname]

Considering that eBay has a market cap that's 20% of Microsoft's, such an acquisition would probably cause a panic among investors and kill the stock. What they're more likely talking about is a partnership/alliance in certain areas.

Ladies and Gentlemen, let me introduce COMPETITION

[B5_geek]

IMHO this is great news.

1) It gives Google _more_ of an incentive to develop GPay and Googles Ebay (G-Bay?).
2) Now all 3 companies that we love to hate are all in one convient package (Pay-Pal, Ebay, MS)

This is Scary because:
Given the excellent security record that Microsoft OSs' have do we really want pay-pal tied into the OS? OR even worse if Microsoft thinks* you are not using a "Geniune" copy of it's OS, will it put a lock you your paypal account and/or deduct the amount straight from your account.
AND EVEN WORSE: This will make it _very_ easy for MS to start charging $xx/(day/week/month) for using Windows.

OMG the sky is falling! =)
Should make for interesting times.
(The Chinese proverb: "May you live in Interesting Times" is apt I think)

Re:doesn't make sense

[GroeFaZ]

Because eBay has something that can't be bought with money: "eBay" is the synonym for "online auction", just like "Google" is synonymous to "web search". That's the Holy Grail of brand recognition.

That explains this new category

[raider_red]

I was on the eBay sight this morning and there's a new category labeled "Vaporware". It only had listings for advance purchases of Windows Vista.

Re:ummm

[free space]

The thing is, Microsoft always had a "Buy for product, not market share" mentality.

Almost all companies they bought have been startups with a really cool product ( Hilgreave, WebTV, Bungie...). As far as I know, Microsoft has never bought a Novell or a Lotus or a Compaq, they kill competition with hard work and/or unfair practices, but not with company acquisitions.

So when you see Microsoft thinking of buying eBay instead of developing an alternative and slowly increasing their market share( like they did with IE) you know they are very desparate and afraid of Google.

BSOD

[Anonymous Coward]

Bid Screen of Death.

In the new Vista, after a crash, you have to have the winning bid before getting your crash dump.

Re:I will stop

[Professor_UNIX]

Actually, PP is subject to that same intense regulation and insurance. So no argument there. Essentially, PP is a bank, just one that's on the Internet.

Show me where in PayPal's user agreement it shows that your money is FDIC insured? Their ridiculous "FDIC passthrough protection" doesn't count because it doesn't protect you in the case of PayPal becoming insolvent, only the bank they invested your money in. Believe me, if PayPal declares bankruptcy you'll be the LAST person with a claim on getting your money out of those bank accounts. Don't be a fool.. if you have more than $50 (or some small amount you're willing to lose) in a PayPal account you're asking for trouble. I even unlinked my checking account from them a few days ago because I am simply not comfortable with such a fucked up company being able to drain any of my "real" money. The only thing I allow as a source of funds now is a credit card so I can fight fraud charges through the CC company. Sure, this mean's I'm "unverified", which is ridiculous since they verified my account via my bank account once, it should stay verified no matter what payment method I choose to use.

Microsoft already charges $xxx/mo

[Aquitaine]

Microsoft has a program called SPLA (Software Provider License Agreement) that anybody who is a Microsoft Partner can join (becoming a Partner is basically filling out a form). There's a bunch of legal stuff you have to sign, but then you get access to their entire library, which you can then resell -- of course you're responsible for supporting it, but you pay MS (or one of their major contractors, like Software Spectrum) a fee per month for each piece of software you use. You can sell per-user 'subscriber access licenses' or per-CPU, unlimited-user licenses. The monthly fees you pay MS are pretety reasonable -- instead of buying SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition for $1500, you pay MS $3/mo/user and charge the client whatever you want. A lot of their commonly-used software is under $5/mo., and some of the more esoteric stuff is only a little more.

That fee includes free upgrades, so if I sell you a Windows license at $5/mo., you would automatically get Vista when it comes out. It's actually a very reasonable program, or at least it appears to be.

No they aren't

[scronline]

Microsoft makes large "enterprise" software packages. Google makes small tools that will probably never come out of beta. They are 2 different business models. Microsoft is a company lead by someone who really doesn't have a grip on reality. He's egotistic and doesn't like the success that Google is getting however right or wrong that success is and that's another discussion. MSN's search is such a small amount of Microsoft's income that it just doesn't makes sense that he would want to crush a search engine.

Google doesn't make an Operating System. Google doesn't make an office productivity suite. Google doesn't make a game console.

Under Ballmer's lead Microsoft is starting to fall apart. It's losing direction because of obsessions with beating Google for whatever reason. So what if Google has taken some of Microsoft's talent. That's the way it is in business. Particularly when employees smell the rot that is starting to consume Microsoft.

Either rate, Google isn't the needle to Microsoft's balloon, Ballmer's obsession with Google is.