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It’s like when one of those Hollywood couples who you thought would really last breaks up. Okay, no, not really. It’s more like when one of those Hollywood couples who you thought “WHAT? Why? That’s gotta be Photoshopped” breaks up. After 16 months of marriage, eBay is rumored to be looking for buyers for the popular social discovery service StumbleUpon.
The reports come from TechCrunch‘s venerable sources that eBay is in touch with Deutsche Bank to find a buyer. So far, TC’s sources have been right at each step of the way, predicting not only the acquisition in April 2007 well before eBay’s then-CEO Meg Whitman would announce it (she denied it), but the exact date of the $75M acquisition announcement the following month.
All along, we’ve wondered what on earth eBay wanted with StumbleUpon. While both services may be good (eBay) to great (SU), there just didn’t seem to be any logical way to integrate online auctions with randomly finding new websites.
Of course, that hasn’t stopped eBay in the past. After buying Skype for a reported $3.1B, they haven’t found a way to make it work with the auctions business either. Rumors earlier this year say that they’ll be selling Skype before the year is out (although perhaps the rumors were wrong about the particular misfit acquisition that would go).
However, while Skype itself remains a pretty popular utility, it appears that StumbleUpon’s popularity has taken a tumble(upon?):
In July [2008] StumbleUpon had 1.3 million worldwide visitors and 25 million page views. Twelve months earlier the service attracted 4.4 million visitors and 31 million page views (Comscore).
With StumbleUpon appearing past its prime, eBay may not be able to recoup its $75M acquisition cost.
Who do you think would make a better match for StumbleUpon?
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