The San Jose, CA-based company's layoffs will reportedly occur primarily in its core Marketplaces division, which has been posting declining single-digit growth but occupies most of the company's square footage. The more significant of the two acquisitions is for its Payments division, which is expected to post double-digit growth thanks to PayPal's adoption by the likes of Wal-Mart and Southwest Airlines.

The layoffs, assuming 200 sf per person, equates to about 320,000 sf of space. As of the start of the year, eBay owned 1.7 million sf and leased an additional 1.9 million sf. The Marketplaces division (eBay.com, StubHub, Shopping.com, Rent.com, Half.com) occupies approximately 1.8 million sf, while its Payments division (PayPal) occupies 1.4 million sf; its Communications division (Skype) occupies about 200,000 sf and its headquarters accounts for the remaining 200,000 sf, according to the company's most recent annual report.

The main acquisition, for $920 million in cash and options, is Bill Me Later, an eight-year-old company from Maryland that allows people to buy items on the Internet but doesn't bill them for 30 days, at which point the buyer may opt to take out a loan rather than pay the bill outright. The other acquisition, for $390 million, was a $390-million, two company purchase from Danish media mogul Karsten Ree. The acquisition includes DBA.dk, a Denmark-based online classified advertising business, and Bilbasen.dk, an automotive marketplace.