eBay set 'to sell Skype at $1.1bn loss'

eBay, the internet auction giant, is poised to unveil plans to offload Skype, the internet calls business, in a potential $2 billion deal. eBay, which conceded in April that its ambitious plans to harness Skype's new technology to boost its core auction business had failed, is understood to have reached agreement with a group of private investors. The New York Times said that the group included Andreessen Horowitz, a new venture capital firm headed by the Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen, Index Ventures, the London-based venture capital group that was among Skype's early investors and Silver Lake Partners.