The Wall Street Journal has reported that Microsoft is in talks to buy the internet phone service, Skype.
The deal could be worth up to $8bn (£4.9bn) according to the USA paper, which would make it Microsoft’s largest acquisition.
Neither Microsoft or Skype have commented on the story to date.
Skype has 663 million users worldwide. The Luxembourg-based compared announced plans for a share flotation in August last year, but was subsequently put on hold.
eBay purchased Skype for $2.6bn in 2006, before selling 70% of it for $2bn in 2009.
Comments
Further promotion for Bing!
Considering Skype launched their advertising service on 8th March this year this move by Microsoft follows very soon after. There appears to be endless benefits for Microsoft in this move including integration with Xbox Live/Kinect, Windows enabled phones, and of course Facebook who already provide Bing search functionality. I think one of the key winners here is going be with advertising however - get prepared to be bombarded with Bing, Xbox and Phone ads, Skypers!!
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