Starboard Nominated Minority Slate of Directors to eBay Board
March 11 2020 - 2:21PM
Dow Jones News
By Corrie Driebusch and Cara Lombardo
EBay Inc. is facing a renewed challenge from activist investor
Starboard Value LP, which has nominated a slate of directors to the
board of the online marketplace, according to people familiar with
the matter.
Starboard, which last year won the right to help fill one seat
on eBay's board, privately nominated an additional minority slate
of directors recently, the people said. Assuming there isn't some
sort of settlement by then, the nominees would be up for election
at the San Jose, Calif., company's annual meeting in June.
Starboard has publicly expressed frustration that eBay hasn't
moved quickly enough to sell its online-classified-ads business or
make changes to its board. Ebay recently closed the roughly $4
billion sale of its StubHub ticketing business. That leaves the
company with the classified business and its core marketplace,
which connects buyers and sellers of everything from electronics to
collectibles.
It couldn't be learned how many directors Starboard nominated to
eBay's 14-person board. Among the nominees is Starboard's head of
research, Peter Feld, who also sits on the boards of companies
including NortonLifeLock Inc.
The move comes after a tumultuous period for eBay, a darling of
the early Internet economy whose marketplace business has been
eroded by the rise of Amazon.com Inc.
Starboard and eBay have been in discussions on and off in recent
weeks, some of the people said, and in late February eBay said it's
exploring options for the classifieds business, which primarily
operates overseas.
Ebay said it's in discussions with multiple potential buyers of
the unit, which could be worth $10 billion. Private-equity firms
including TPG and Blackstone Group Inc., as well as internet
conglomerate Naspers Ltd., German publishing company Axel Springer
SE and others have expressed interest, people familiar with the
matter have said.
The marketplace business has also drawn takeover interest. New
York Stock Exchange operator Intercontinental Exchange Inc.
approached eBay about a deal before its own shareholders balked,
forcing it to back off the idea.
EBay, which has a market value of roughly $28 billion, has been
without a permanent chief executive since Devin Wenig departed in
September following clashes with the board. The interim CEO is
Scott Schenkel, who previously served as chief financial
officer.
Another activist, Elliott Management Corp., has board
representation in the form of a seat for Jesse Cohn, a senior
official at the hedge-fund firm. Starboard said in February that it
owns more than 1% of eBay's shares, while Elliott has said it owns
a stake of more than 4%
Write to Corrie Driebusch at corrie.driebusch@wsj.com and Cara
Lombardo at cara.lombardo@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
March 11, 2020 14:06 ET (18:06 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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