Online coupon service providers a hot commodity

Posted by on June 17, 2011

Contact: Brian Satterfield With Groupon’s IPO looming on the horizon, the online coupon business model is attracting more attention than ever before. That’s also coming through in deal flow, with the number of transactions in the emerging sector having increased more than six-fold so far this year compared to last year. The main driver for [...]

eBay bids high for GSI

Posted by on March 28, 2011

Contact: Ben Kolada In its largest deal in the past half-decade, eBay is set to acquire e-commerce vendor GSI Commerce for $2.4bn. The company hasn’t made such a move since September 2005, when it forked over $2.6bn for VoIP provider Skype. And while hindsight shows that eBay certainly overpaid for that property, on an equity [...]

IronPlanet: heavy metal and high margins

Posted by on March 29, 2010

Contact: Brenon Daly We recently noted that for the IPO market, thin is in. The offering sizes for many of the would-be debutants have been trimmed, as have the initial valuations. But in one area, some of the companies that are looking to come to market are still very, very bloated: funding. Force10 Networks, which [...]

EBay unwinds and adds on

Posted by on April 16, 2009

Contact: Brenon Daly For a company that essentially matches buyers and sellers, eBay has been doing a lot of dealing of its own this week. It has picked up a controlling stake in Gmarket, the South Korean online auction house. When we wrote about this possible deal in mid-August, we noted that eBay was willing [...]

Returning to eBasics

Posted by on October 14, 2008

Despite market turmoil, eBay recently inked one of the largest Internet acquisitions of the year. The deal returns eBay’s focus to its core auction and payments business. We believe this marks the beginning of the end of the eBay/Skype debacle.

eBay places bid

Posted by on August 15, 2008

EBay has failed repeatedly to break into Asia. In true adherence to the phrase ‘if you can’t beat them, buy them,’ eBay is now attempting to acquire its Korean competitor Gmarket. Will this change eBay’s fortunes?