Changes In Skype Announced

Now about two and a half months since acquisition eBay has made some moves to put some layers of management into the free wheeling, radical minded Skype.

An eBay insider, Henry Gomez has been named general manager of Skype North America. The newly-formed division has been established to better serve Skype users in the region. Gomez had been senior vice president of corporate communications and government relations at eBay Inc. He previously reported to Meg Whitman, and for now he will report to Mr. Zennstrom. Under Meg Whiteman Gomez had global responsibilities for public relations, community development, internal communications and government relations. He is also chairman of the eBay Foundation, eBay’s charitable giving organization.

Clearly this is a guy who knows how to communicate and work the political machine including how to lobby. My take is Skype/eBay knows they have some issues to contend with from government regulators here in the USA so they put a silver tongued type into the top spot to get through whatever the FCC has to offer. That on face is logical, but Skype needs to come clean about if they want to be a Phone Company or something more Voice 2.0 like. The old Skype was always about the latter but the new Skype is sending vibes about being both. Since you can't be a little bit pregnant, Gomez has to figure all that out.

According to the account I heard Gomez is the senior eBay executive number three to join the Skype team. Alex Kazim, who was a senior vice president of new ventures at eBay, has joined Skype to take charge of several "new business areas." Rajiv Dutta, eBay’s chief financial officer, will become to president of Skype worldwide after his successor is named.