It looks like Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) could be jumping its last major regulatory hurdle in its bid to buy Skype: it is expected to get clearance from the European Union’s competition commission, paving the way for the transaction to close by the end of this year. The deal was first…

Tom noted the other day how the two big news stories that bookended last week—Google (NSDQ: GOOG) buying Motorola (NYSE: MMI), and HP (NYSE: HPQ) canning its mobile strategy—could prove to be a boost to Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) and its Windows Phone OS. Now, there are reports emerging of handset…

While regulators have yet to give Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) the final approval to buy Skype, the Internet communications company is making some acquisitions of its own. Today, it announced that it will be acquiring GroupMe, a group messaging company, for an undisclosed sum a price reported to be between $50…

Why is Microsoft paying $8.5 billion for Skype when less than two years ago the VOIP service was valued at under $2 billion? Asked about that premium during a call with analysts this afternoon, Microsoft CFO Peter Klein said the company arrived at the valuation after determining both the “intrinsic…

Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer and (a very quiet) soon-to-be Microsoft Skype division president Tony Bates went on CNBC (NSDQ: CMCSA) this morning to defend the rationale of the $8.5 billion acquisition. The bottom line: Microsoft believes its many products—from Hotmail to Xbox—can all benefit from tie-ins to the…

Steve Ballmer, the CEO of Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT), today said his company first decided to buy Skype when the two were in discussions on an advertising deal (advertising is one way Skype has hoped to make more money off those millions of people who steadfastly refuse to take up its…

Making its biggest bet yet on something it didn’t build, Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) confirmed today that it is paying $8.5 billion in cash for Skype.

Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT), which has been quiet on the deal front for several years now, is reportedly set to change that in a big way, picking up Skype for $7 billion-plus. The Wall Street Journal (NSDQ: NWS) cites sources who say a deal could be announced as early as Tuesday;…

Ebay may have decided that Skype was not an asset worth keeping—selling, in 2009, two-thirds of the company it paid more than $3 billion to acquire in 2005. But apparently some other big Internet hitters—namely Facebook and Google (NSDQ: GOOG)—think otherwise.

As Skype gears up to list on the Nasdaq, the free Internet voice and video calling company is rolling out more services to generate revenue. Today it announced that it will be featuring in-app advertising, starting with its Windows client in the U.S., UK and Germany.

Update: Skype confirmed that it has bought mobile video streaming and sharing site Qik. Qik has developed a lot of expertise in transmitting video over wireless, and some of Qik’s features—recording, sharing and storing video—are a natural complement to Skype’s own video telephony products, which it offers via fixed and…

It’s been a long time coming, but it’s come just in time, after one of the worst weeks in Skype’s history: the P2P telephony giant’s newest iOS app now lets Skype users on iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices make video calls to other Skype users for free.

The internet telephony service Skype got a good deal out of the net neutrality vote earlier this week, with the FCC deciding that Skype and other voice services like it could not be banned or throttled on broadband networks. But services in the past 24 hours seem to show that…

The UK’s congested wireless networks may soon be getting an extra traffic lane: today, Ofcom took one further step along the route to putting services into the country’s “white spaces”, or parts of unused radio spectrum between television channels. A similar plan is gradually progressing through the U.S. regulatory system…

Skype is taking a step toward popularising the service - it’s releasing a version 5.0 Windows client that includes Facebook integration, meaning… —Skype users can call out to phone numbers listed in friends’ Facebook profiles.

Skype’s top engineering executive has left the company for “personal reasons,” the NYT says. Skype had hired Madhu Yarlagadda away from Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) in early July to oversee the company’s engineering and development initiatives as chief development officer, succeeding CTO Dan Berg.

“I don’t understand why they need to IPO,” Mike Chalfen, a partner with Advent Venture Partners, tells paidContent:UK, after Skype filed for a $100 million public flotation... “The company isn’t yet as profitable as it will be in a couple of years. If it was more fully maturing into its…

Skype’s $100 million IPO filing shows a company with big ambitions to monetize the online telecoms space, but with relatively few customers so far and plenty of risks in sight… The document reveals how the company’s current owners had to raise $825 million in debt to buy the company from…

In a couple of years, the time parked in eBay (NSDQ: EBAY) may be a distant memory for a publicly traded Skype. The VoIP firm has filed for an IPO with the SEC, looking to raise $100 million in what could become one of the world’s biggest online telcos.