The group of investors which bought the internet telecoms pioneer Skype from eBay is planning a snap stock market flotation less than a year later.

An initial public offering on Nasdaq is planned to capitalise on the company's continued strong growth. Skype boasted in a document filed yesterday that it had 560 million registered users, and had logged 95 billion minutes of voice and video calls in the first half of 2010. A public market for the shares will help eBay to cash out its remaining 30 per cent stake and show whether its buyers made a good bet when valuing Skype at $2.75bn (£1.73bn) in September.

The consortium was led by Silicon Valley venture capitalists Silver Lake with Andreessen Horowitz, a fund which was set up by the web browser pioneer Marc Andreessen.