New Delhi: PayPal is splitting from EBay and will become a separate and publicly traded company next year. The separation is expected to occur in the second half of 2015.
EBay said Tuesday that its board decided that the separation was the best path for growth and shareholder value creation for each business. Dan Schulman, the president of the enterprise growth group at American Express, will be the new president at PayPal, effective immediately. The 56-year-old will become PayPal's CEO once the separation takes place.
EBay Chief Executive John Donahoe had resisted demands by activist investor Carl Icahn to hive off the service, saying PayPal was integral to eBay's business - and vice versa. Icahn backed off from his demand in April.
"A thorough strategic review with our board shows that keeping eBay and PayPal together beyond 2015 clearly becomes less advantageous to each business strategically and competitively," Donahoe said in a statement on Tuesday.
After the tax-free spinoff to shareholders, the new eBay will be headed by Devin Wenig, president of eBay Marketplaces and former head of the Markets division of Thomson Reuters Corp.
Donahoe and Chief Financial Officer Bob Swan will oversee the separation and serve on the boards of both companies.
PayPal was founded in the late 1990s and went public in 2002. It was acquired by eBay soon afterward for $1.5 billion. PayPal had 143 million active users at the end of 2013, up 16 percent from a year earlier.
(With inputs from agencies)
Comments
0 comment