eBay Watch: Skype Reaches 9 Million Users, Microsoft To Rival PayPal

A number of key developments to note for eBay (EBAY) watchers:

Skype Reaches 9 Million Concurrent Users

Yesterday Skype reached 9 million peak concurrent users. Read more about it at on the Skype Blog. But despite the new record, growth does seem to be slowing considerably. I have mentioned before that peak concurrent users is not the only criteria to asses growth but it is certainly the easiest metric to access.

Blogger Jean Mercier has been recording the number of days it takes to add each additional 1 million users. Plotting his data on a time-line and running a regression analysis shows the peak concurrent users are growing linearly rather than exponentially. This is not great news for Skype as it implies that absolute growth rates are falling.

Microsoft (MSFT) To Set Up Online Payment System

Microsoft is developing on an online payment system that will be cheaper than credit card transactions, making it possible for companies to charge small fees for Web-based content and services they now offer for free. Microsoft's move into Internet payments could threaten credit card companies' online profits. Gates described a system that would undercut credit card fees, making it profitable for an online newspaper to charge small fees for individual articles, for example.

Another potential competitor for PayPal. Nevermind that Microsoft has failed in the past to introduce a popular online payment system (remember Microsoft Wallet and Microsoft Passport). Nonetheless, it's not very welcome news for eBay coming so close to Google's (GOOG) full-effort attempt at rolling out Google Checkout.

Comments

[MitchCastillo]

Maybe Microsoft is trying to send a message to VISA and MasterCard that they can't gouge consumers by slapping on enormous interchange fees to merchant transactions. It's a huge profit making scheme for the industry and my organization, UnfairCreditCard Fees.org, is tired of letting them make the rules behind closed doors. It's THE biggest credit card fee that anyone has ever heard of...to the tune of $30 billion!