eBay 2007 Annual Report Download - page 19

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• PayPal Plus Credit Card and eBay MasterCard issued by GE Money Bank, which allow users to earn rewards
on purchases made offline or using PayPal. We also offer a PayPal Credit Card to UK users through
GE Money;
• PayPal Plug In, which allows users to use their PayPal account to make payments on the Internet everywhere
that MasterCard is accepted (including websites that do not accept PayPal);
• PayPal Pay Later, which is a personal transactional credit account issued by GE Money Bank that allows
users to finance PayPal purchases; and
• PayPal Money Market Fund, which allows participants to earn a yield on the funds in their PayPal account.
Communications
We added the Communications segment through our acquisition of Skype in October 2005. Founded in August
2003, Skype is a leading global Internet communications company and is headquartered in Luxembourg, with
offices in Europe, the U.S. and Asia.
Skype Value Proposition
Skype seeks to set the standard in providing new and easy ways to stay in touch over the Internet. Our vision is
to enable our users to communicate freely at home, at work and on the move. Skype offers a simple, convenient, and
cost-effective way for people anywhere in the world to communicate from their computers over the Internet to other
computers, landlines and mobile phones.
Skype Overview
Millions of people everyday make free Skype-to-Skype voice and video calls and send instant messages using
Skype. Skype users pay a low per-minute fee for long-distance and international calls to landlines and mobile
phones, and pay fees for other features such as SMS (text messaging), voicemail and call forwarding. Skype users
can also purchase a variety of subscription plans that provide an unlimited number of calls.
Highlights of Skype’s activities in 2007 included: Skype’s launch of the 3 Skypephone in partnership with
mobile operator 3; an agreement with Wal-Mart to sell Skype-certified hardware devices and prepaid cards with
Skype credit throughout Wal-Mart stores in the U.S.; a global partnership between Skype and MySpace to bring
Internet voice communications to MySpace users; and the introduction of Skype Send Money, which allows users to
send/receive money using PayPal through the Skype client. We continue to make improvements to the Skype
product, and late in 2007, we launched Skype 3.6, which provides High Quality Video calling through a
collaboration with Logitech.
User Base
Skype software has been downloaded more than half a billion times and is available in over 34 languages. As of
December 31, 2007, Skype had over 276 million registered users and was used in almost every country around the
world.
Skype software is designed to be extremely secure, sustainable and scalable. At peak times, there are over
11 million concurrent users and over 180,000 simultaneous calls.
Ecosystem
Skype has a large and expanding ecosystem that includes nearly 6,000 developers and over 50 partners. As of
December 31, 2007, there were more than 190 Skype Certified hardware products.
Skype Growth Strategy
To expand upon Skype’s position as a leading global Internet communications company, we will continue to
focus on acquiring new users and converting users to premium offerings, while further developing two broad areas
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