The deal paid off in May 2011 when Microsoft bought Skype for $8.5 billion.

Bill Gates: buying Skype was an idea he pushed on the Microsoft board.

EBay bought Skype last year for $2.6 billion and additional payments based on its performance.

Yeah, um, M$ has bought Skype so you need to slide them off of your little fanboy hate list.

And as we know, Microsoft bought Skype recently for $8.5 billion.

Microsoft will buy Skype for $8.5 billion in cash.

Ultimately, it's not the act of buying Skype that's so astonishing.

Last week there was noise of Facebook buying Skype.

Back in '06/'07 when eBay picked them up it made total sense to buy Skype.

It's unknown how far in advance the design team knew about the company's plans to buy Skype.