MEG Whitman, one of the original commercial warriors of the online world and a genuine industry legend, is to step down as president and chief executive of auction house eBay at the end of March.

She will be replaced by John Donahoe, currently president of eBay Marketplaces, which accounts for more than 70 per cent of the company’s global revenues.

When Ms Whitman joined eBay in March 1998, the company was a US-only online auction house with just 30 employees and 500,000 registered users – and revenue of $4.7 million. Today, the company has hundreds of millions of users worldwide, more than 15,000 employees and nearly US$7.7 billion in revenue.

“With humor, smarts and unflappable determination, Meg took a small, barely known online auction site and helped it become an integral part of our lives,” eBay founder and chairman Pierre Omidyar said.

In addition, eBay announced that Rajiv Dutta, currently the President of PayPal, has been named Executive Vice President of eBay and will also replace Mr Donahoe as President of eBay Marketplaces. Mr Dutta has also been elected to the eBay board.

Dutta is a 10-year eBay veteran who has previously served as the company’s chief financial officer, and president of Skype, eBay’s communications business. Since July 2006, Mr Dutta has successfully led PayPal to achieve more than US$65 billion in payment volume and three consecutive quarters of accelerating revenue growth.

Scott Thompson, PayPal’s current chief technology officer, will replace Mr Dutta as president of PayPal.