Posts tagged as:

strategy

When I interviewed Skype CEO Josh Silverman at CES 2010 in January, I had asked about the timing for a Skype IPO. Josh’s response:
“We’ll see. We don’t have a timeline for it. Our focus is to build a really great company. When we’re ready and the markets are ready, we’ll consider an IPO. At [...]

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Categories Communications News, Service Providers, Skype News, Skype Operations, To Be Categorized

This morning, at the CEA Line Show in New York, Skype is taking the first step in the evolution of its revamped developer platform with the beta release of SkypeKit, “empowering consumer electronic and desktop software innovators to embed Skype into their products”.
In summary:

Most importantly, SkypeKit allows developers to embed all the functionality of [...]

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Categories Communications News, Developers, Embedded Skype, Skype Hardware, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Platform, Using Skype, Video calling

Ok so I’m the last to write about Google’s announcement this morning on its acquisition of Global IP Solutions, a major provider of IP-based communications infrastructure with not only its voice and video codecs but also voice and video engines that mean simply “supply me with an Internet connection, a microphone and a set [...]

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Categories Communications News, Communications Technology, Mobile Applications, Video calling, Web 2.0 Tools and Applications

Full disclosure: This post was prepared prior to today’s press conference using information that was publicly available prior to the conference. In the second post I’ll discuss the service as announced at CES today.
When you can advertise “Free phone calling internationally”, they will come! In the CES interview with Skype CEO Josh Silverman, Josh [...]

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Categories Communications News, Embedded Skype, Mobile Applications, Mobile Devices, Skype Channels, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Platform, Skype Software, Skype on Mobile, Using Skype, Wireless Carriers

At last month’s CES I had the opportunity to meet with Skype CEO Josh Silverman and discuss various Skype issues that have arisen over the past year as well as where Skype is headed as a privately owned company. At the time I thought this would result in a normal text-based blog post outlining [...]

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Categories Communications Stories, Mobile Applications, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Platform, Skype on Mobile, Using Skype

The Skype Spinout Version 2.0

by Jim Courtney on Mon, Nov 9, 2009 11:11 am

So it’s finally resolved. The Skype spinout from eBay will involve Skype’s founders as investors and board members while contributing a cash investment. Skype finally owns the core intellectual property required for Skype to operate at its current cost levels. eBay gets the cash they were looking for but 5% less of the new [...]

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Categories Communications News, Skype News, Skype Operations

Two announcements yesterday, when meshed together, create the setting for Skype to become, de facto, the ‘”unofficial” personal communications software provider for the 2010 Winter Olympics at Vancouver and Whistler, B.C. next February:
Skype President Josh Silverman today posted: “Good Move AT&T”:
Since launching our iPhone application six months ago, people have downloaded and installed Skype [...]

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Categories Communications Stories, Service Providers, Skype News, Skype on Mobile, Wireless Carriers

While participating in an interview session earlier today at the National Retail Federation’s annual Shop.org summit in Las Vegas, eBay CEO closed off questioning about the pending sale of Skype with “… there’s nothing new on that; this deal’s going to close.” AuctionByte’s Ina Steiner put out this video on her post, eBay CEO: [...]

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Categories Communications News, Skype Bytes, Skype News

Building on Skype’s recent announcements of its evolving Skype for Business activities, Chief Strategy Office Christopher Dean gave a keynote address yesterday at a joint VON/Channel Partners Conference session. Three posts have followed up on the session:
Khali Henderson, in Skype Not Just Telecom’s “Bad Boy”, CSO Says, reports Christopher’s overview of their approach to [...]

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Categories Skype For Business, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Partner Solutions

Over the past two weeks we have started to see signs of a transition period for Skype’s developer support activities. Yes, Skype Extras is dead; however the current Skype API’s remain supported. Jonathan Christensen gave Michael Arrington at TechCrunch some hints of forthcoming developer support activity.  Skype for Asterisk was launched three weeks ago. [...]

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Categories Communications News, Conversation Providers, Skype Channels, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Platform

The recent announcement of Skype’s decision to drop its Skype Extras (marketing) program initially caused much anguish across the blogosphere; however, more sober commentary has been appearing in the past few days. To recall the announcement:

Immediately: No new partner programs or upgrades will be placed into the Skype Extras
Going forward: Skype Extras will remain [...]

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Categories Communications News, Developers, Service Providers, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Partner Solutions, Skype Platform

Post image for Demythifying the Skype Developer Story

Demythifying the Skype Developer Story

by Jim Courtney on Sun, Sep 13, 2009 1:09 pm

On Friday the Skype Developer Blog posted a blog announcing the end of the Skype Extras program in what amounts to two stages:

Immediately: No new partner programs or upgrades will be placed into the Skype Extras
Going forward: Skype Extras will remain available via the Skype for Windows client until their certification expires (which [...]

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Categories Developers, Skype News, Skype Partner News, Skype Partner Solutions, Skype Platform

OK, now I have your attention with a headline different from the “Skype sold for $2.75 billion” headlines so rampant in the blogosphere yesterday….
By now the web has been saturated with stories about yesterday’s announcement of the forthcoming acquisition of a 65% controlling interest in Skype by a consortium of investors, led by SilverLake [...]

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Categories Communications News, Skype News, Skype Platform

Skype For SIP: Sorting Through the Issues

by Jim Courtney on Tue, Mar 24, 2009 10:03 am

Yesterday’s announcement of the Skype for SIP beta created lots of commentary in the blogosphere; it remained the leading topic on Techmeme for several hours.

Phil Wolff over at Skype Journal, in “Skype For SIP: Big Money, Skypeless, Brand Destroyer”, outlines some of the positioning with respect to Skype for Asterisk, channel schism issues and [...]

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Categories Communications Stories, Skype For Business, Skype Platform

Yesterday eBay held an analyst event at its San Jose headquarters location with a keynote by eBay CEO John Donahoe followed by presentations by various eBay executives and Skype President Josh Silverman.
Josh’s presentation broke a lot of new ground for Skype addressing issues such as:

How does Skype generate revenue?
What drives Skype’s cost model?
How will [...]

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Categories Skype News, Skype Operations