Head Of Half Com example essay topic

315 words
The popular online auctioneer eBay Inc. is planning to close its Half. com Web site at the end of 2004, by which time it will have merged all the items for sale on that site into the appropriate categories on the eBay site, a spokesman said on Thursday. Half. com, which eBay bought in the summer of 2000, for $241 million in stock, features books, music, and videos for sale. Some eBay executives and analysts had expected the eBay and Half. com combination to compete with online retailer Amazon. com Inc. Josh Kopelman, 32, the head of Half. com, will leave the company April 15, after heading the company since it was acquired, said eBay spokesman Kevin Pursglove. Kopelman made the announcement to the 65 staffers at the Half. com offices in Philadelphia in a meeting earlier on Monday, Pursglove said. "The eBay team was aware of his desire to move on and they " ve been discussing that for the last four to six months", Pursglove said, adding that Kopelman did not have any immediate plans for a new job or start-up.

Kopelman will be succeeded by Mike Aufricht, previously head of marketing at mobile software maker AvantGo, and will have the same title as Kopelman, vice president of eBay Media, Pursglove said. When eBay acquired Half. com more than a year ago, it said that ultimately all of Half. com would ultimately be integrated into eBay. In the summer of 2002, eBay, which is based in San Jose, California, began to merge user IDs, customer feedback and log-on processes into its Web site and operations, an earlier phase of that integration. The 65 workers in Philadelphia will be offered jobs at other eBay locations.

If they elect not to take another position within eBay, they will be offered a severance package, said Pursglove.