In preparation for next year's split from PayPal, online retailer eBay may be planning to cut thousands of jobs, or 10 percent of its workforce, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The cuts are expected to be localized in the company's marketplace division, the report said, citing unnamed sources. By reducing overhead, the planned layoffs could make eBay a takeover target, the Journal reported.

The spin-off was announced three months ago—just about a year after activist investor Carl Icahn put pressure on the company to split the fast-growing PayPal from eBay, which is facing competition from Amazon and Alibaba.

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PayPal's revenue grew 20 percent year over year in the third quarter to $1.95 billion, while eBay's revenue grew 6 percent.

Ebay bought the online payment processing service in 2002 for $1.5 billion.

It hasn't been confirmed where eBay's chief executive John Donahoe will go, although according to two people who have discussed the topic with him, Donahoe said he plans to join the board of PayPal, as reported in Re/Code.