How big is Skype’s company/market?
To put it simply, the market for Skype messenger is vast. Given that the number of internet users in the world was about 1.3 billion in December 2007, that’s a lot of people who can potentially use Skype. In fact, I’d argue that there’s a big proportion of the world’s population who already uses Skype!
What about the 3 Skypephone? Well, put it this way: with over 65 million mobile phones in the UK, and given that the UK population rightly want cheap calls, that’s at least 65 million people who would potentially benefit massively from the 3 Skypephone! And you could be one of them!
The history of Skype
Skype began life in 2003, when Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis founded the company. That was when the first little bit of code was laid down to create a fun, easy to use bit of software for calling your mates on the internet. The following events were instrumental in the world of Skype:
Source: Wikipedia
| September 2002: |
Investment from Draper Investment Company |
| April 2003: |
Skype.com and Skype.net domain names registered. |
| August 2003: |
First public beta version released. |
| September 2005: |
SkypeOut banned in South China. |
| October 2005: |
eBay purchased Skype (Oct 14). |
| December 2005: |
Video-telephony introduced. |
| April 2006: |
Number of registered users reaches 100 million. |
| October 2006: |
Skype 2.0 for Mac is released, the first full release of Skype with video for Macintosh. |
| December 2006: |
Skype announces a new pricing structure as of January 18, 2007, with connection fees for all SkypeOut calls. Skype 3.0 for Windows is released. |
| March 2007: |
Skype 3.1 is released, adding some new features, including Skype Find and Skype Prime. Skype also released a 3.2 beta with a new feature called Send Money which allows users to send money via PayPal from one Skype user to another. |
| August 2007: |
Skype 3.5 for Windows released with additions such as video in mood, inclusion of video content in chat, call transfer to another person or a group, auto-redial. |
| August 15, 2007: |
Skype 2.7.0.49 (beta) for Mac OS X released adding availability of contacts in the Mac Address Book to the Skype contact list, auto redial, contact groups, public chat creation, and an in-window volume slider to the call window. |
| August 16/August 17, 2007: |
Skype users unable to connect to full Skype network in many countries. Skype reports the system-wide crash was the result of exceptional number of logins after a Windows patch reboot ("Patch Tuesday"). |
| November 2007: |
Skype users are set to lose their 0207 numbers after 20 December 2007. |
| December 2007: |
The first phone from Skype is released – the 3 Skypephone |
| January 30, 2008: |
Skype released for the Sony PSP handheld gaming system. |
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