eBay

In the fall of 1995, programmer Pierre Omidyar, who now lives in the city of San Jose, California (San Jose, California), launched an online auction on his website, which he called Auction Web. History has preserved the fact that the first item sold in this way was Omidyar's defective laser pointer. Moreover, even the price at which it was sold was preserved - 13.8 US dollars. It is alleged that it was acquired for his collection by a certain collector of laser pointers. Truth or fiction is now difficult to establish. But the fact is that Internet users liked the idea of an online auction so much that after a few months, auctions were held daily.

Initially, the auction was completely free for both sellers and buyers. However, Omidyar quickly realized that he had stumbled upon a gold mine. Having carefully thought through all the conditions, rules and business model, in 1997 he transferred his (by that time already extremely popular) brainchild to a commercial footing. The principle is simple - the auction receives a certain percentage of the sales that the seller pays to it. In the matter of sending the purchased eBay takes no part.

Being part-time owner of a consulting company Echo Bay Technology Group, the programmer decided to call the auction echobay. But the corresponding domain was taken and Omidyar shortened the name to eBay.

Anything is for sale on eBay

The pace of development of the company probably surprised even its founder. In just a few years eBay becomes one of the leaders in e-commerce. Income allows not only to develop, but also to absorb competitors. So, in 1999, the online payment system was absorbed billpoint and online auctions Butterfield & Butterfield и Alando (now eBay Germany). This was followed by several more major acquisitions, of which the purchase of a payment system should be especially noted. PayPal, which is now actively used in settlements at auctions taking place on the pages eBay. However, in 2015 the payment system again spun off into a separate company.

The list of acquisitions is very long and of little interest. However, one point should still be noted in particular - another major purchase eBay was a takeover in 2005 of the company Skype, which in 2011 was bought by Microsoft. What eBay bought for 2.5 billion, was sold for 8.5 billion - the deal turned out to be very profitable.

To date, bidding for eBay carried out continuously. This is not only an auction, but the world's largest sales system, which also works like a regular online store. All sorts of lots are exhibited - from used things to brand new ones, from socks to airplanes. There are sometimes completely unique lots, for example, when people sell parts of their bodies for a tattoo of any promotional offer (usually this is removed from the auction by the eBay).

Amounts paid from one dollar to several million. They sell both very interesting little things, as well as outright nonsense and outright garbage (however, there are buyers for it too). Purchases are distributed all over the world. And since 2010 eBay also available in Russian.