Increased Resistance: Voting eBay’s CEO onto Intel’s Board
eBay and Amazon Continue to Innovate in the E-Commerce Market
Intel’s shareholders are urged not to vote for John Donahoe
Lately, eBay’s (EBAY) CEO, John Donahoe, has been in the news quite often. According to a recent report from the Wall Street Journal, two proxy firms have urged Intel’s (INTC) shareholders to vote against Donahoe for the position of director at Intel—due to his poor attendance at meetings held by Intel’s board.
However, a spokesperson for Donahoe mentioned in a letter that last year was an extraordinary year for him. This is why he couldn’t attend the meetings.
Donahoe’s extraordinary activities last year
It’s true that Donahoe was involved in a number of activities last year. First, the company had to overcome issues resulting from SEO (search engine optimization) changes that Google (GOOG) made last year. The second issue was to overcome the effects of a major database breach last year. It compromised eBay’s database.
Then, eBay announced its split with Paypal in September last year after resisting pressure from activist investor Carl Icahn. Management even made some rules that both eBay and PayPal should abide by after the split. We discussed this aspect in eBay and PayPal Will Be Tightly Integrated Even after the Split.
In addition to the activities related to split, Donahoe has also been busy managing eBay’s business. He received a lot of criticism from investors as eBay’s Marketplaces revenue declined by 4% YoY (year-over-year) in the last quarter.
The above chart shows the dramatic decline in the Marketplaces business for eBay. A strong US dollar (UUP) played a major role in this decline. However, even without considering the currency issues, eBay’s Marketplaces only showed revenue growth of 3%. In comparison, Amazon’s (AMZN) revenue increased by 15% in 1Q15, while Alibaba (BABA) has been able to achieve revenue growth in excess of 40% in the last few quarters.
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